Former Judge Paul Hawkes on Judicial Salaries – Part 2

Judge Paul Hawkes, certainly while he was on the court, always maintained that the reason for this geographic and employer bias in judicial selection was because of judicial compensation. If judges were paid more, the state could attract interest in serving as a judge from a greater number of qualified individuals. When Judge Paul Hawkes was appointed he did not need to move, he did not need to change his children’s school, in fact the distance of his commute into work did not even change. To limit the selection of judges to only those living in Tallahassee and working for the State of Florida is simply not the best way to choose judges.

 The problem is not limited to the First DCA. The current Chief Justice of the Supreme Court served with Judge Paul Hawkes on the First. At the time Justice Polston become Chief Justice of the Supreme Court; six of the seven justices were employed by the State of Florida prior to be appointed to the court. Florida has 19.5 million people and about 100,000 lawyers. Judge Paul Hawkes had repeatedly said while he was a judge, that to limit the pool of eligible applicants for the Supreme Court to lawyers employed by the State of Florida is foolish. Judge Paul Hawkes argued that as one of the most important legal jobs in Florida, Justices should be paid at least $100,000 more than they currently are paid. And, although Judge Paul Hawkes would agree that there is no ‘magic’ number the state could attract a more diverse pool of applicants if DCA judges were paid $50,000 more per year.

The opinions are simply those of former DCA Judge Paul Hawkes, but he thinks that Florida appellate courts do important work and we should not jeopardize the quality of their work by failing to attract the best applicants possible.