Lehigh Valley judge tapped for Superior Court

June 21st, 2008, posted by RobHop

For a decade, colleagues and supporters of Northampton County President Judge Robert A. Freedberg have touted him as fit for state or even federal judicial robes.

Freedberg almost made it in 1998, until a multi-name deal for a federal bench fell victim to Washington politics, dooming his nomination by President Clinton to the U.S. District Court.

But now Freedberg is on the winning end of similar circumstances in Harrisburg and apparently headed for Pennsylvania Superior Court.

In all, the Democratic governor made four nominations — two Democrats, two Republicans — after the Republican-controlled Senate rejected his earlier slate. Rendell also nominated:

  • Jane Cutler Greenspan, a Philadelphia common pleas court judge, for a state Supreme Court seat.
  • John M. Cleland, president judge of McKean County Court, for a separate Superior Court vacancy.

  • And Johnny J. Butler, a lawyer with the Philadelphia law firm of Booth & Tucker, for a Commonwealth Court vacancy.

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A Strong Group

On June 21st, 2008 Anonymous said:

This is, on the whole, a strong group of nominees. The weakest link is Johnny Butler, because of a relative lack of experience and because it would take an exceptional nominee to compare favorably with Ken Gormley, whom the Governor originally nominated for the Commonwealth Court vacancy. It speaks volumes about the need to throw out the current Senate leadership that the Senate would have rejected someone of Professor Gormley’s qualifications; in contrast to the others on the Governor’s original slate, nobody had voiced one word of criticism of Prof. Gormley, and it is a shame that the Governor did not renominate him. Apart from that lapse, this is a strong group and a better group of judges than we would be likely to see produced by the current partisan election system for our statewide courts. It is a shame that these nominees will serve only 18 months, because Judges Greenspan, Cleland and Freedberg are better than the other judges on the courts on which they will serve.

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