Great judges, a great WILLAMETTE tradition
Re-engineering the courts The high school students visiting the Supreme Court on a field trip look slightly bored as the opposing lawyers argue about the details of an automobile accident insurance payout. They become more animated afterward when De Muniz explains the outlines of the case to them and then describes how the court system works. “The Supreme Court is at the intersection of every political, economic and social issue of your time,” he says in his talk about the importance of civic education and the role of the courts. “You can’t take that understanding for granted. It has to be taught and nurtured with every generation.” But the lofty words don’t always jibe with the reality of shrinking budgets. That’s why De Muniz is so passionate about re-making the courts. He has seen what happens when the wrong man is imprisoned because the translator doesn’t speak his language, but he also knows the economic realities on the ground. Re-engineering the courts is his implicit acknowledgment that Oregon’s financial crisis isn’t temporary.
“A court system is not like a faucet that can be turned on and off at will. It is not a program to which you can restrict eligibility. Timely and complete justice is a constitutional right for Oregonians.”
In October 2010, De Muniz gave the Justice William Brennan Jr. Lecture on State Courts and Social Justice at New York University Law School. He said that judicial leaders must critically examine traditions, culture and processes that courts have developed or accepted for hundreds of years. His goal is to make Oregon’s courts the first in the nation to be fully electronic and accessible to the public 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Other initiatives include electronically processing
collections, traffic citations and jury management in a central location instead of through 27 separate judicial districts; assigning complex civil cases to judges experienced in such litigation regardless of where the case is filed; and centralizing the adjudication of prisoner lawsuits. “It is time to change at a fundamental level the nature of the discourse between our three branches of government respecting how we fund our state’s court system,” he says. “A court system is not like a faucet that can be turned on and off at will. It is not a program to which you can restrict eligibility. Timely and complete justice is a constitutional right for Oregonians.”
18 | Willamette Lawyer