Happy Birthday, Dcas

California's Courts and Judges: Happy Birthda)ly DCAs From the 19th to the 21st Century BY KENT L. RI C HLA N D B Y DONNA SC H UELE The miss ion of the California Supreme Court In less than three years, the Supreme Court has Historical Society is much broader than is implied experienced the passing of three justices, Stanley by its name. The Society is dedicated to the preser Mosk, Marcus Kaufman and David Eagleson . vation and promotion of the history of California's Having previously memorialized Justices Mask and entire judicial system. As a consequence, this is an Kaufman, the California Supreme Court Historical important year for the Society - it is the centennial Society pays homage to Justice Eagleson in this issue of the establishment of California's intermediate of the Newsletter. R ick Seitz, who se rved as a appellate courts. On November 8, 2004, the First, research attorney for Justice Eagleson, provides an Second and Third Appellate Districts will be one admiring view of his contributions to the Court and hundred years old. California jurisprudence. Justice Eagleson's daughter In the beginning - the beginning, in this in Beth, herself a member of the bar, follows with a stance, being 1849, the year the California touching portrait linking the professional and the Constitution was adopted - the state's only appellate personal in her father's life. court was the Supreme Court. Then comprised of a This issue's focus on the Court and its members Chief Justice and two Associate Justices, the Court continues in two more directions. Looking back, heard appeals from the decisions of both trial court Fran Jones and Martha Noble offer a survey of 150 and the alcaldes (local officials who combined years of California's chief justices, in a fasc inating the duties of mayor, police chief and judge), so comparison of the nineteenth and twentieth cen long as the amount in controversy exceeded two turies. Their article complements an exhibit on the hundred dollars. chief justices on display through July at the Court's For several years the Supreme Court's caseload headquarters in San Francisco. And, spotlighting rema ined man ageable because , as R epo rter of one of our more infa mous chief justices, David Terry, Decisions Charles A. Tuttle explained, "little atten Los Angeles Times reporter Cecilia Ras mussen tion was ... paid to the acquisition of any other entertainingly reminds us that frontier California property than gold." But with the growth of mining earned its "wild west" reputation not without help and agriculture came a need for greater predictabili from the bench and bar. ty in the ownership of real property, a problem made Moving forward, our current C hief Justice, all the more complex by the fact that much property Ronald M. G eorge, and Court of Appeal Justice was held under Spanish and Mexican land grants, Patricia Bamattre-Manoukian highlight a very and boundaries were vaguely defined at best. As a twenty-first-century role that the Court has under result, in 1862, the Constitution was amended to taken - engaging in public outreach and education increase the number of Associate Justices to four through annual special oral argument sessions held and to increase the jurisdictional threshold to three around the state. In 2001 , the Court heard argument hundred dollars. in Santa Ana, and in 2002 traveled to Fresno. In The burgeoning caseload led, in 1880, to the th is iss ue, C hief Just ice George and Justice addition of two more Associate Justices, bringing the Bamattre-Manoukian describe the Court's 2003 total number of justices on the Court to its present return to San Jose for the first time in nearly 150 complement of seven. But at the sa me time, the years. Building on the experiences of the Santa Ana Court was divided into two divisions composed of and Fresno sessions, those planning the San Jose ses three justices each - thus ostensibly doubling the sion succeeded in involving a wide range of partici number of cases that could be heard - with provision pants: students ranging from high school to law for en bane hearings in the discretion of the Chief school, local attorneys and judges, dignitaries and Justice or on the vote of four Associate Justices. others, in a variety of programs both educational By 1904, with the population of California teem and social. ing at 1.4 mill ion, even the reshuffled Supreme This newsletter issue focuses on other aspects of Court could not handle the volume of appeals. Three California's judicial branch as well , looking both for District Courts of Appeal were created: district one ward and back in time. Society President Ken t embraced the County of San Francisco and other Richland draws attention to this year's one-hun counties generally in the center Colltilllled oil page u dredth anniversary of the Court of Colltinlled oil page 15 NEWS LETTER· S PRI NG /SU MMER 2004 3 lengthy gestation period required for major improve trained historians will be enticed to attempt a com ments in the judicial branch. The process is acutely prehensive history of this 150-year period of judicial evolutionary rather than revolutionary." administration." Committed to Justice additionally discusses major With the publication of Committed to Justice, efforts at court improvement, including civil delay Larry Sipes has built an excellent foundation for reduction, expanded judicial education, the rise of future historians of the California courts. He is to be alternative dispute resolution and the courts' efforts commended, along with William Vickrey, the cur at improving access to justice for California's diverse rent Administrative Director of the Courts, who population. As Sipes noted to me, "The resulting commissioned him to undertake this project. The book is admittedly a selective list of milestones that question now is, who will take up Sipes' challenge to seemed most worthy of memorialization." Sipes has continue this effort? chosen well, and there is much to be learned from his Richard Schauffier is the Director of Research treatment of the issues he selected. Services at the National Center for State Courts in Yet, beyond the milestones he explicates, myster Williamsburg, Virginia. A native Californian, he pre ies remain for future historians to unravel. Why did viously worked at the California Administrative Governor Deukmej ian veto the 1984 Trial Court Office of the Courts. Funding Act, delaying state funding of the trial courts for over a decade? What impact did the un LET US HEAR FROM YOU seating of Chief Justice Rose Bird in 1986 have on subsequent judicial retention elections? Why did the Send suggestions for On Your Bookshelf and Member Judicial Council and the AOC take no position on News contributions to: [email protected]. the Trial Court Delay Reduction Act of 1986, and why are they more proactive now in the legislative arena? How are we to understand the rise of prob lem-solving courts (also known as collaborative jus Happy Birthday tice courts, therapeutic justice, etc.) for adjudicating Continuedfrmn paie 3 drug cases and domestic violence cases, and what is their impact on traditional forms of adjudication? The California courts are engaged in a large-scale of the state; district two covered Los Angeles Coun transformation of their economic, political and social ty and those counties in the southern part of the foundations, as well as a redefinition of their role in state; and district three consisted of Sacramento society. Such a change cries out for informed analysis County and the more northern counties. One panel and broader public discussion, in a continuation of of three justices sat in each district. Cases moved the project that Sipes has begun. Judicial officers, between the Supreme Court and the District Courts court administrators, AOC staff, litigators and those of Appeal with some fluidity, since the Supreme generally interested California law, policy and history Court had the discretion to assign any case within will all find much to engage them in Committed to its original jurisdiction to be heard in any District Justice. For those involved in or affected by judicial Court of Appeal, and by the same token could pluck administration, understanding where in the courts' for its own hearing any case pending in a District evolution they find themselves will render them Court of Appeal. more effective actors in ongoing efforts to improve access to justice. While there is little danger in this One hundred years later, our intermediate appel instance that those who do not know this history late courts have matured. We now have six districts, will be forced to repeat it, it is also true that courts and those districts are in tum divided into nineteen change slowly, and understanding the events of 1986 divisions. The number of appellate justices has is still of great relevance to understanding what is increased from nine to one hundred five. In the vast happening in judicial administration today. majority of Supreme Court cases, review is granted Rimbaud once noted that "a poem is never fin only after a Court of Appeal has heard the appeal ished, it is abandoned in despair." Less dramatically, first. And, incidentally, under Article VI, Section 3 but equally impassioned, Sipes acknowledged, "The of the California Constitution, our intermediate greatest disappointment [in researching this book] appellate courts are now called simply Courts of was the almost total absence of recorded perspectives Appeal, rather than District Courts of Appeal. of leaders of the judicial branch. I would hope that Old-timers, however, still affectionately refer to an effort can be made to capture the knowledge and them as "DCAs." experiences of current and former chief justices and Please join me and the other members of the So administrative directors of the courts, and that ciety in wishing our DCAs a happy one-hundredth! NEWSLETTER· SPRING/SUMMER 2004 I I .

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