Allowing House Bill 1020 to stand “would constitute a tremendous transfer of power from the voters of Mississippi, who have for over 100 years elected our circuit judges, to the Legislature,” attorney Cliff Johnson told eight members of the Mississippi Supreme Court during hearings Thursday.
The hearing did not include Chief Justice Michael K. Randolph, who recused himself from the case. H.B. 1020 gives him the power to appoint unelected judges to serve in majority-Black Hinds County, where the capital City of Jackson is located. Under the law, the chief justice would appoint four new judges to serve in the Hinds County Circuit Court until 2026 and one permanent municipal judge to serve in the Capitol Complex Improvement District.
Legislative leaders said during debate over H.B. 1020 that their goal was to make Jackson safer and fight crime. Opponents of the law have long argued that the appointments will take power away from locally elected circuit court judges and diminish Black voters’ power in Hinds County. During the July 6 hearing, though, Johnson argued that the circuit court appointments are not allowed under Article VI, Section 153 of the Mississippi Constitution, which says “judges of the circuit and chancery courts shall be elected by the people.”
“The Constitution provides no category of special judges or temporary special judges even,” said the MacArthur Justice Center director, who made arguments on behalf of three Jackson residents who are plaintiffs in the case. He called H.B. 1020 “radical legislation that unconstitutionally packs the Hinds County court.”
Mississippi Solicitor General Scott Stewart defended the law during the hearing, pointing out that “the Legislature has long provided for these appointments.” That includes three currently serving judges in Hinds County that the chief justice appointed under a previous law; the plaintiffs are also challenging those appointments.
“This has been responsibly used, calibrated, often with appointments of several months, but always in situations of important public need,” the solicitor general told the eight justices.
The “consequences” of overturning H.B. 1020 and ruling that such appointments to circuit courts are not allowed under the Mississippi Constitution “would be
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