New Federal Judges

"What I do want is a judge who is sympathetic enough to those who are on the outside, those who are vulnerable, those who are powerless, those who can't have access to political power and as a consequence can't protect themselves from being . . . dealt with sometimes unfairly"

-- Barack Obama in May 2008.

The federal courts have had relatively little impact on Social Security in recent years. This may change as the composition of the courts changes over the next four or eight years as a result of Barack Obama's appointments. A Washington Post article reports that 56% of the judges on the Courts of Appeals are now Republicans. Congress seems likely to approve a bill to add 14 judges to the Courts of Appeals and 52 District Court judges.

The most dramatic change will occur at the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals. Republicans have a 6-5 majority on the court, but there are four vacancies on the Court.

My advice in recent years on appealing to the 4th Circuit has been to not appeal, no matter how strong the case or how egregious the mistakes below may have been. It has literally been impossible to win at a Court this has become astonishingly right wing. The impression given was that the judges of the 4th Circuit did not bother to read the briefs before entering two paragraph per curiam opinions.

There will also be a change in control of the 2d and 3d Circuits as well.