Common Pleas Court Judge Eugene Maier, one of the toughest (perhaps THE toughest) sentencer of all Common Pleas Court judges, held a party last night to commemorate his reaching the age of 70 and thus reaching the mandatory retirement age as a Common Pleas Court judge. Under the Pennsylvania constitution, he has to retire at the end of this year. His four children, with the help of his grandchildren, organized the party.

I personally think this is an outdated requirement from the Constitutional Convention of forty years ago, and I would favor its elimination. Maier plans to be in the active workforce in the years to come, and has no shortage of children and grandchildren that he would greatly enjoy helping meet the personal and financial challenges of life.

We have been friends since the 1970's, when we both were part of the opposition to Mayor Frank Rizzo's plans to take over the Democratic Party and repeal the two-term limit for Philadelphia's strong-mayor system of government. He and my father were runningmates, along with others, in the 1979 Democratic primary.

I was one of the speakers at the dinner, and I recalled one of Maier's lines from the 1978 Charter Change campaign. "Frank Rizzo wants to be Mayor for life. Well, I am already Maier for life."

I also recalled the "Marge and Gene" show in which both city (Election) commissioners fought loudly and publicly about the minutia of the office, usually settled quietly behind closed doors without any public protest because of its usually non-controversial nature.

The Marge and Gene show got them both front page coverage in the city's newspapers, plus extensive television coverage. Having two city election commisssioners fighting bitterly with each other week after week was so compelling that it made them both household names. To the disappointment of both of them, who each campaigned against the other with a preferred runningmate, they both won landslide victories in the 1979 Democratic primary, being "sentenced" (my word last night) due to extraordinarily high name recognition to four more years of fighting each other. Gene nodded when I noted that this outcome encouraged him to resign and successfully seek judicial office in 1981.

Many of his friends and family members publicly testified last night to his extraordinary warmth and concern for them. He is certainly one of the finest men that I know. He played a key role in getting mail registration started before it was a national mandate and before the vast majority of states had it. He also played a key role in getting a state law passed that stopped the commissioners from running the elections when they themselves were candidates for re-election.

One of the anecdotes from lawyer Dennis Cogan was telling. He represented a client before Maier. Maier said that he and Cogan had gone to law school with him, and they had remained good friends, and therefore Maier thought it appropriate for him to disqualify himself from the case and assign it to another judge. Such is Maier's reputation for tough sentencing that other clients before Maier soon were trying to hire Cogan to get Maier out of their lives.

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Improving government for the average citizen


Thanks for electing me Delegate to the Democratic National Convention From the First Congressional District Supporting Barack Obama. Serving as an Obama delegate was a truly inspiring experience.

I agree that several points of the judicial system need to be amended. I am not a fan of forced retirements and I feel this should be one of the issues addressed.

So, do you have plans to propose an amendment?

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Czar of the 26th Ward.

Forced retirement at age 70 is stupid.

My father works for the State of Texas, commutes 50mi to work everyday, inspects coal-fired power plants and other air polluters weekly, and he's 73. He wears a hard-hat and is behind a desk only 50% of the time. He's a PE and his job is math-intensive.

To say that you're too old to sit on a bench at 70 seems archaic.


(This has nothing to do with merit selection.)

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WHYY pays their CEO $750,000 a year. So WHYY should I renew my membership? Seems they have no problems finding money and spending it unwisely.


And this is why you should donate to PACCA, not PETA:

In September, PETA made headlines in Vermont and across the nation for asking Ben & Jerry's ice cream to use human breast milk in their ice cream, instead of cow milk

Forced retirements undermines independence of the judiciary, as judges are more and more planning to work way beyond age 70, and sounding out prospective employers way before age 70.

The City Board of Judges makes things worse by requiring senior judges (part-time judges who have already retired) to forfeit office space, thus further emphasizing their demotion in status.

I intend to introduce a constitutional amendment on this point.

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Improving government for the average citizen


Thanks for electing me Delegate to the Democratic National Convention From the First Congressional District Supporting Barack Obama. Serving as an Obama delegate was a truly inspiring experience.

Please do not feel bad for the senior judges. Most of them come back and stay until they are 80, while they collect their pensions (and a salary for being a senior judge). They and their spouses get a lifetime pension, medical and nursing home insurance.

It also works the other way. These 40 something judges that we have elected with no experience practicing law will be around for 30 years! Do we really need another 20 years of this if the senior rule was eliminated.

I hate to say it, but while someone like Maier who has retained his mental acuity, their are plenty of judges who are close to 80 that have not.

Instead of worrying about senior judges, we should really be concerned with electing qualified experienced jurists. In my opinion, that probably should be older practitioners who are seasoned litigators and who have tried cases. Unfortunately, for the most part, that is not what is happening.

As you pointed out there are plenty of unqualified judges at age 50 as well, so obviously we shouldn't use age as a determining factor.

As for elections, it would be nice to see them eliminate judicial elections and switch to appointment based like the federal courts with possibly some sort of retention schedule.

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Czar of the 26th Ward.

The issue is not just fairness to the judges, but fairness to the litigants and the court system. Many of these older judges have not only the legal acumen to continue sitting full time, but also the wealth of real life and courtroom experience that benefits the attorneys and parties who come before them. Judges who have been on the bench for lengthy periods of time move cases more quickly, cut through a lot of bs that bog things down, know when to push a case to settle and when to push it to trial, and are often more decisive because of the confidence they have in their abilities. Moving those judges to senior status, which means they take far fewer cases and often only be special assignment, means litigants are deprived of the benefit of these highly experienced judges.

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---Shosh