Health & Fitness
Want to Be a Judge? Get to Know a Legislator (or Marry One)
If you want to put on the black robe in South Carolina, it pays to have connections in the General Assembly. Your chances are even better if you were once part of the legislative club.
After state lawmakers last year created nine new judicial seats, 50 attorneys went through the formal screening process for the positions, including two former S.C. House members, the spouse of a current state representative, and a law partner of a former House member.
When the dust settled after January’s judicial elections in the General Assembly, the two ex-lawmakers – Keith Kelly of Spartanburg County and James McGee of Florence County – along with Maite Murphy, wife of Rep. Chris Murphy, R-Dorchester, and Randall McGee of Calhoun County, then a law partner of former Rep. John Felder Sr., were among the winners of the nine new seats.
That represents 44 percent of the new seats. And it’s not a new phenomenon in the history of the Palmetto State’s court system.
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The nine new judges officially started their first six-year terms on Monday. Kelly and Murphy won two of the three newly created at-large circuit court seats, while James McGee, who ran unopposed, and Randall McGee (no relation to James McGee) were elected to two of the six new at-large family court seats.
None of the four new judges responded to phone messages this week from The Nerve.
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In an interview Monday with The Nerve, Rep. David Mack, D-Charleston and a member of the S.C. Judicial Merit Selection Commission, which nominates judicial candidates for election in the General Assembly, acknowledged that ex-lawmakers “tend to have the heads up” in judicial elections.
“We have not figured out a way to remedy that,” he said. “We’re trying to have a level playing field for everyone.”
But Mack said although he voted for the new judges in the January elections, their legislative connections were not the determining factor for him, noting, “There are some members of the House who are so opposed to my value system that if they ran for anything, I would not see myself voting for them.”
Rep. Murphy abstained from voting in his wife’s Jan. 30 election, House Journal records show. He did not respond to a phone message this week from The Nerve.