Kentucky

Retired Judge Stan Billingsley has a post on the struggle over dollars between the judiciary and the legislature as state courts struggle to make payroll in the face of reduced revenues and shrinking budgets.  Of course, the courts have always been at the fulcrum point between the executive and the legislature with the strength flowing from public support and confidence in the rule of law and the administration of justice.  Remember from law school the quote attributed to President Andrew Jackson upon his disagreement with a SCOTUS decision authored by Chief Justice John Marshall?   "John Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it!" Whether he said it is disputed.

Nonetheless, those who forget history are doomed to repeat it.  The SCOTUS squabble involving the lost election of Gore to Bush II cost the court much credibility, but fortunately the world was safer than now, and job security and and a strong economy softened the public's perception.

People living from paycheck to paycheck will cast a jaundiced eye at courthouses that rival the Taj Mahal in splendor. 

The heart of justice is in its administration, not it's abode.

In light of an earlier story about the AOC in need of SEVENTY-SIX MILLION DOLLARS TO KEEP THE COURTS OPEN DAILY, time will tell weather this financial storm will take its toll.

Kind of puts another jurisprudential spin on the "open courts" doctrine.

CAN THE JUDICIARY MANDATE THAT THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH ADEQUATELY FUND THE COURT SYSTEM?



Courts over the years have protested cuts in their budgets by the Executive Branch by threatening to mandate a budget and to order the Executive Branch to fund the budget as drawn up by the courts.

The judiciary in New York has threatened to do this, but never carried through with their threat.



Now, possibly for the first time, a State Supreme Court has issued a formal ruling that assets the right of the Judiciary as an equal branch of government to mandate their own budget.



The Mississippi Supreme Court  last week issued such a ruling.

click on above heading for rest of Stan's post!