Court Opinion

ID: 9528611
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:42:28.478634+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:27:06.576922
License: Public Domain

LOUIS J. CECI, J.
(concurring). I concur in the result of the opinion but must write separately to express my concern with respect to the judge-shopping which is practiced under the present judicial substitution law.
Nowhere in the federal judiciary are defendants permitted to file requests for substitution, because federal *163judges are sworn to uphold the Constitution of the United States. All members of the Wisconsin judiciary take the same oath, yet substitution on demand is practiced routinely for the purpose of avoiding judges who are sworn to be fair and who in practice are conscientious, impartial, and fair. This insult to the integrity of the Wisconsin judiciary standing alone is of no consequence; however, it has had and is having a devastating effect, in my view, on the administration of justice.1 Judge-shopping makes the system work less well, is extremely costly, and is, therefore, clearly not in the public interest.
Substitution frustrates the ability of the judiciary to effect an efficient judicial rotation system. It also can deprive a one-judge county of the services of the duly elected judge by prohibiting such judge from hearing cases at the exclusive option of a defendant in a criminal case and any party in a civil case.
Article VII, sec. 3 of the Wisconsin Constitution2 vests in the supreme court superintending and administrative authority over the judiciary of this state. I believe it is time that this court end this unwarranted, costly, and unnecessary legislative interference with the orderly administration of justice.
I am authorized to state that Justice William G. Callow joins in this concurring opinion.

In calendar year 1990, a total of 7,326 substitution requests were filed.

Wis. Const, art. VII, sec. 3(1) provides as follows: "Supreme court: jurisdiction. Section 3. [As amended April 1977] (1) The supreme court shall have superintending and administrative authority over all courts."