Court Rejects Lungren’s Bid

In your editorial on the state Supreme Court’s ruling on the Lungren nomination (“Lungren Loses,” June 24) you failed to remind your readers why there would be any question regarding the “independence” of the Supreme Court from the governor who appointed five of its justices.

The governor who did more damage to the integrity of our state Supreme Court than any other was Jerry Brown. He appointed one of his top campaign aides and personal confidantes, Rose Bird, who had not one day of judicial experience, to the chief justice position.

Bird’s tortured reasoning on issues ranging from tort law, the death penalty and the 1982 reapportionment fiasco exemplified the most blatant partisan association of the judicial branch with the legislative and executive branches that this state has ever seen.

You rightly report this case as a test of the court’s independence from partisan politics. But your professional duty requires you to remind your readers how the judicial branch had become degraded by partisan politics and what steps the Deukmejian Administration has taken to reverse that degradation.

ANTHONY GONZALEZ

Sacramento