Take the Big View on Courts

The commission studying the future of the U.S. 9th Circuit of Appeals could do some real good for overloaded courts by examining the work of all 11 federal circuits and making adjustments in their staffing and geographical boundaries, where necessary. Instead, the panel created by Congress last year seems a thinly disguised effort to split the 9th Circuit--which covers California--partly as political retaliation for some of the court’s liberal decisions.

A breakup has won support from two U.S. Supreme Court justices--Anthony M. Kennedy, who once was on the 9th Circuit, and Sandra Day O’Connor, who supervises the circuit. But a breakup doesn’t make sense and Californians can only hope that the panel will listen to other than just a partisan political agenda as it drafts its recommendations.

The 9th Circuit is by far the largest of the federal circuits, covering California and eight other western states. The court has more judgeships than others and handles a whopping 20% of all federal appeals. Yet until Congress began to starve the court of manpower, at one point stalling the confirmation of 10 nominees to its 28-member bench, the court had kept pace with its staggering workload.

There is little that’s sacred about the existing boundaries of any circuit, and a neutral review of them all would be prudent and timely. But a division of the 9th Circuit doesn’t by itself resolve disparities in workload and staffing. The appellate caseload in California alone means that a separate circuit for just this state--one option being discussed in an apparent effort to isolate some of the most liberal judges--would still be the nation’s busiest, leaving a possible new 12th Circuit with much less to do. And Arizona, now part of the 9th Circuit, would be geographically isolated from the northwestern and mountain states that it would join in a new circuit, undermining the argument that dividing the 9th Circuit would increase collegiality among judges. Splitting California between two circuits, another suggestion, would be even worse, subjecting different parts of the state to different interpretations of federal law.

A neutral, balanced study of the appellate court system is still possible. Sound policy, not politics, should dictate the outcome.