Governor Rendell held a news conference today stressing the importance of House and Senate bills that would change the way Pennsylvania chooses its appellate judges from elections to Merit Selection. The constitutional amendment process requires that Pennsylvanians vote on this proposal to make such a change.

Governor Rendell will hold a news conference at 11 a.m. tomorrow in Harrisburg to discuss merit selection of judges. At PMC we are happy that the governor is addressing such an important issue and pressing for action.

Earlier this week the state Supreme Court issued orders that will make several changes in how criminal cases are handled in Philadelphia Municipal Court.

In Allegheny County this week, a grand jury returned a presentment against Senator Jane Orie and her sister Janine Orie, a member of Justice Joan Orie Melvin’s staff, for violations of laws regarding political activity by state employees on taxpayer-funded time.

An editorial in the Harrisburg Patriot-News calls for getting money out of the judicial election system and moving to Merit Selection for the appellate courts.

Governor Rendell has nominated Judge Robert Freedberg of Easton to fill the interim vacancy on the Superior Court created by Joan Orie Melvin's election to the Supreme Court.

The four Democrats (Allegheny County Executive Dan Onorato, Auditor General Jack Wagner, Sen. Anthony Williams, D-Philadelphia, and Montgomery County Commissioner Joe Hoeffel and two Republicans (Attorney General Tom Corbett and state Rep. Sam Rohrer) running for Governor met at the Government Reform Debate.” Five of the six supported implementing Merit Selection for the appellate courts.

ABC27 in Harrisburg ran a story last night titled "Political Contributions to Statewide Justices Questioned," focusing on the recent American Judicature Society finding a significant overlap between contributors to Pennsylvania Supreme Court justices' election campaigns and lawyers, litigants, and law firms later appearing before those justices.

According to yesterday’s Legal Intelligencer (subscription required), a new (and revised) study put out by the American Judicature Society has added fuel to the on-going debate in Pennsylvania over judicial elections. In fact, many state lawmakers and reform groups have already been working to get rid of judicial elections in favor of a merit selection process for appellate court judges.

PMC and PMCAction’s editorial appears in today’s Legal Intelligencer (subscription required), outlining why a change from judicial elections to a merit selection process for Pennsylvania’s selection of appellate court judges is important and why the time to begin the steps to undertake such a change is now.