In this morning's Inquirer ("Pa. court splits its decision on raises," by Mario Cattabiani and Amy Worden), we read:
In a decision that is renewing public anger, the state Supreme Court yesterday ruled that the legislature violated the state constitution by allowing lawmakers to take midterm pay raises last year.
But the court stopped short of requiring House and Senate members who accepted the extra money to reimburse the state, ruling that they "acted in good faith" that the law was constitutional.
Separately, the court reinstated the raises for 1,000 members of the state judiciary - including its own - that ended when the legislature repealed the pay hikes amid an outpouring of public outrage in November.
Read the entire article here (http://www.philly.com/mld/philly/15522081.htm). Previous Inquirer coverage on the topic, as well as a list of state legislators and how they voted, can be found at go.philly.com/payraise
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2 comments:
How is ruling on a law that includes their own pay raise not a conflict of interest for the state supreme court?
I realize this was an unusual case, but we need a mechanism to deal with future scenarios where the entire state court system has a conflict of interest. Maybe something like having a bi- or non-partisan panel of out-of-state or retired Pennsylvania justices selected by the merit system to hear and rule on cases like this would be a good idea.
PD,
I agree completely.
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