Wednesday, April 19, 2006

Trying to take judges out of micromanagement

According to Democracy by Decree (OpinionJournal, April 18, 2006), Tennessee Republican Lamar Alexander and Arkansas Democrat Mark Pryor introduced legislation in the Senate last month to limit the use of federal consent decrees, and similar legislation is pending in the House. Mentioned in the editorial is this book --

Democracy by Decree: What Happens When Courts Run Government
Democracy by Decree: What Happens When Courts Run Government


-- by New York Law professors David Schoenbrod and Ross Sandler. I've linked to the paperback edition (Yale University Press, September 2004).

From the publisher (via Barnes & Noble):

This valuable book explains why schools, welfare agencies, and other important state and local institutions have come to be controlled by attorneys and judges rather than by governors and mayors. The authors discuss why this has resulted in worse service to the public and what can be done to restore control of these programs to elected--and accountable--officials.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

It's a wonderful idea to take judges out of micromanagement. Despite 20 years of hard proof that judges are lousy managers, the trend keeps growing and growing.