QUOTE
Gov. Picks Moderate to Replace Brown on High Court
By Peter Nicholas and Maura Dolan
Times Staff Writers
1:22 PM PST, December 9, 2005
SACRAMENTO — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger named Carol A. Corrigan to the California Supreme Court this morning, replacing an ideological conservative with a judicial moderate.
Corrigan is a former prosecutor, former Democrat and self-described centrist who will replace the notable conservative Justice Janice Rogers Brown, who left last summer to take up a presidential appointment to a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C.
"She's a brilliant jurist," Schwarzenegger said today, referring to Corrigan as "classy," "experienced" and "knowledgeable."
Corrigan, 57, becomes the sixth Republican on the court. One justice is a Democrat. Corrigan's appointment leaves no African Americans on the state's highest court.
"It is a tremendous honor to be nominated to sit on this most distinguished court," Corrigan said this morning.
The jurist has said she changed her voter registration from Democrat to Republican in the mid-1990s because "that seemed the most accurate designation" at the time.
"I haven't changed," she said in an earlier interview. "I think the political environment may have changed, and it continues to evolve in this country."
Asked which present or former U.S. Supreme Court justice she admires, Corrigan cited Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. "I think she is a centrist ... a real consensus builder," Corrigan said.
"I think I would probably be a centrist anyplace I found myself," she said
Other judges said Corrigan probably will be philosophically close to Chief Justice Ronald M. George, who is conservative on law and order issues and more moderate on social issues. George is often a swing vote on the court.
Corrigan recently led a multiyear effort to rewrite California's jury instructions so they could be better understood by jurors. Her work won national recognition.
She also has long been active in Catholic Church charities. "I have been a Catholic all my life and very supportive of Catholic charities," she said.
But she added that her religion will not influence her rulings, and she indicated that she may not personally adhere to all the church's teachings.
"I was raised to believe that everybody has an obligation to inform their own conscience, and that is my understanding of the Catholic tradition as well," she said.
She was named to the Alameda County Municipal Court in 1987, and former Gov. Pete Wilson elevated her to the Superior Court and then the Court of Appeal.
Corrigan spent 12 years in the Alameda County district attorney's office. She has served on many advisory boards on judicial policy, including the President's Commission on Organized Crime, the President's Task Force on Victims of Violent Crime. She taught at law schools at UC Berkeley and the University of San Francisco.
She graduated from Hastings College of Law and did graduate work in clinical psychology at St. Louis University.
Corrigan is a native of Stockton.
Schwarzenegger's choice must be approved by a special commission made up of California Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer, Justice Ronald M. George, chief justice of California, and Court of Appeal Justice Joan Dempsey Klein.
By Peter Nicholas and Maura Dolan
Times Staff Writers
1:22 PM PST, December 9, 2005
SACRAMENTO — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger named Carol A. Corrigan to the California Supreme Court this morning, replacing an ideological conservative with a judicial moderate.
Corrigan is a former prosecutor, former Democrat and self-described centrist who will replace the notable conservative Justice Janice Rogers Brown, who left last summer to take up a presidential appointment to a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C.
"She's a brilliant jurist," Schwarzenegger said today, referring to Corrigan as "classy," "experienced" and "knowledgeable."
Corrigan, 57, becomes the sixth Republican on the court. One justice is a Democrat. Corrigan's appointment leaves no African Americans on the state's highest court.
"It is a tremendous honor to be nominated to sit on this most distinguished court," Corrigan said this morning.
The jurist has said she changed her voter registration from Democrat to Republican in the mid-1990s because "that seemed the most accurate designation" at the time.
"I haven't changed," she said in an earlier interview. "I think the political environment may have changed, and it continues to evolve in this country."
Asked which present or former U.S. Supreme Court justice she admires, Corrigan cited Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. "I think she is a centrist ... a real consensus builder," Corrigan said.
"I think I would probably be a centrist anyplace I found myself," she said
Other judges said Corrigan probably will be philosophically close to Chief Justice Ronald M. George, who is conservative on law and order issues and more moderate on social issues. George is often a swing vote on the court.
Corrigan recently led a multiyear effort to rewrite California's jury instructions so they could be better understood by jurors. Her work won national recognition.
She also has long been active in Catholic Church charities. "I have been a Catholic all my life and very supportive of Catholic charities," she said.
But she added that her religion will not influence her rulings, and she indicated that she may not personally adhere to all the church's teachings.
"I was raised to believe that everybody has an obligation to inform their own conscience, and that is my understanding of the Catholic tradition as well," she said.
She was named to the Alameda County Municipal Court in 1987, and former Gov. Pete Wilson elevated her to the Superior Court and then the Court of Appeal.
Corrigan spent 12 years in the Alameda County district attorney's office. She has served on many advisory boards on judicial policy, including the President's Commission on Organized Crime, the President's Task Force on Victims of Violent Crime. She taught at law schools at UC Berkeley and the University of San Francisco.
She graduated from Hastings College of Law and did graduate work in clinical psychology at St. Louis University.
Corrigan is a native of Stockton.
Schwarzenegger's choice must be approved by a special commission made up of California Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer, Justice Ronald M. George, chief justice of California, and Court of Appeal Justice Joan Dempsey Klein.