Federal court vacancies in Atlanta remain unfilled

By Bill Rankin

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

The weeks and months continue to pass and the cases keep piling up at the federal courthouse in Atlanta, where four judicial vacancies remain unfilled.

Three of the vacancies have been open since early 2009 and the other since January. Georgia Democrats who looked forward to President Barack Obama shaping the federal judiciary here are expressing frustration at the slow pace of the nomination process and wondering whether the administration is missing an opportunity.

In past months, Obama nominated Amy Totenberg, the former general counsel for the Atlanta Board of Education, and Steve Jones, a Superior Court judge from Athens, to fill two of the vacancies. But the Senate Judiciary Committee has yet to schedule confirmation hearings for them.

The president has not submitted nominations to fill the other two vacancies, even though Georgia's Democratic congressional delegation has recommended an Atlanta lawyer and a Fulton County judge to fill the positions.

The vacancies were created in early 2009 when federal judges Clarence Cooper, Orinda Evans and Jack Camp took senior status with reduced caseloads. When Obama put Beverly Martin, another federal judge, on the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in January, the fourth vacancy opened up.

"I'm surprised this has taken so long," Cooper said last week. "I wish they had been filled long ago."

More than 3,500 civil and criminal cases have been filed so far this year in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, headquartered in Atlanta. The district is allotted 11 judgeships, but with the four vacancies there are now seven full-time judges to hear cases.

U.S. District Judge Ashley Royal from Macon recently traveled to Atlanta to hear a case to help with the court's docket.

Carl Tobias, a University of Richmond law professor who tracks the judicial nominations, said the Obama administration needs to move more aggressively to fill vacancies. Of the country's 858 appeals and district court judgeships, 101 are unfilled, he said.

"The Northern District of Georgia is one of the worst-case scenarios in the country," Tobias said.

In early 2009, Georgia's Democratic congressional delegation appointed a committee to screen applications for judicial vacancies. The panel, led by Atlanta lawyer George "Buddy" Darden, sent a short list of names to the delegation, which then forwarded its recommendations to the White House.

Totenberg was among those recommended by the delegation, yet it took the White House almost a year before it sent her nomination to the Senate for approval.

The delegation also recommended Atlanta lawyer David Worley and Fulton County Superior Court Judge Constance Russell for two other vacancies, according to lawyers familiar with the judicial nominating process. But when Georgia's two Republican senators, Johnny Isakson and Saxby Chambliss, expressed opposition, the White House did not nominate Worley or Russell.

Worley declined to comment last week, and Russell did not return phone calls seeing comment.

It has not been easy to get nominations cleared by the Obama administration because Georgia has no senators who are members of the same political party as the president, Darden said last week.

"Consequently, we have been assigned a lower degree of importance," he said. "It's frustrating."

Doug Moore, chief of staff to Democratic Rep. Jim Marshall of Macon, said there are no immediate plans to reconvene Darden's committee to seek new recommendations for the two vacancies.

"We have recommended very qualified individuals and we are very happy with them," he said.

In a joint statement, Isakson and Chambliss said their own screening committee vetted both Totenberg and Jones and recommended that they should receive confirmation hearings. The two senators noted they have given the White House advice on potential candidates for nomination.

"Consistent with our constitutional obligation of advise and consent, there are some potential candidates the White House has mentioned that we told the White House we could not support," the senators said.

La'Keitha Daniels, president of the Georgia Association of Black Women Attorneys, called on Obama to nominate more African-Americans to the federal bench in Atlanta, where all seven of the court's full-time judges are white.

Daniels said her group was pleased Obama nominated Jones, who is African-American, to fill one of the four vacancies. But she noted Jones, the Clarke County judge, does not live in the Northern District.

"The Northern District has a plethora of highly qualified African-American lawyers and judges to choose from," she said.

Stephen Bright, senior counsel for the Southern Center for Human Rights in Atlanta, agreed.

"There is simply no excuse for the lack of diversity on the federal court in Atlanta," he said.

Of Obama's 87 nominees to the federal district and appeals courts, 20 are African-American and 37 are minorities, according to information provided by the White House.

"The president has nominated a steady stream of well-qualified judicial candidates from diverse backgrounds who will respect the rule of law and understand how the law impacts Americans' daily lives," White House spokesman Adam Abrams said last week. "The president has moved swiftly to fill vacancies considered to be judicial emergencies and, when brought to a floor vote, [they] have passed with strong bipartisan support."