Radical judicial appointments

NOVEMBER 19, 2009.The White House Butler
A judge twice rejected by voters is nominated by President Obama..ArticleComments (.As consolation prizes go, Louis Butler can't complain. After being twice rejected by Wisconsin voters for a place on the state Supreme Court, the former judge has instead been nominated by President Obama to a lifetime seat on the federal district court. If he is confirmed, Wisconsin voters will have years to contend with the decisions of a judge they made clear they would rather live without.

But after serving four years, voters had seen enough of his brand of judicial philosophy, making him the first sitting justice on the Wisconsin Supreme Court in four decades to lose a retention election last year.

In Ferdon v. Wisconsin Partners, he drew the rage of doctors and others when he dismantled the state's limit on noneconomic damages in medical malpractices cases—the kind of tort reform that had been serving the state well. Business groups were likewise floored by his decision in Thomas v. Mallet, which allowed "collective liability" in lead paint cases—making any company a potential target, regardless of whether they made the paint in question. His nickname as a public defender was "Loophole Louis," a name that stuck when, as a judge, he was considered to be soft on crime.


State court judges like Mr. Butler are likely to be an important source of nominees for President Obama. Because Democrats have been out of office since the Clinton Administration, many of the liberal judges on the federal district courts are older, an incentive for the White House to comb state courts for new judges—especially for the federal appeals courts.

Mr. Butler's nomination also shows the return to prominence of judicial ratings by the American Bar Association, which traditionally gives extra weight to "judicial experience." The ABA, which was ousted by the Bush Administration in part because of the ABA's notorious liberal bias, is now back in favor in the Obama White House. Mr. Butler served on the ABA's Standing Committee on Judicial Independence, a group that like Justice at Stake critiques how that independence is supposedly compromised by the need to raise money for judicial elections.

Mr. Butler's nomination shows the dominance of liberal ideology in Mr. Obama's judicial selections, and especially a contempt for Wisconsin voters.

Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page A20