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Judges Who Were Clerks of Court Bring Special Perspective to Bench

When dealing with budget woes in the Southern District of Iowa, Chief Judge Ronald Longstaff brings to the challenge the insights he gained in his eight-year tenure as the district's clerk of court.

"Certainly, as we're struggling with budget problems, my prior experience has given me a greater sensitivity to the clerk's perspective and the difficult staffing decisions looming in the face of tremendous budgetary problems," Longstaff said.

Chief Bankruptcy Judge J. Rich Leonard in the Eastern District of North Carolina, who served as the District Court's clerk of court for 13 years, believes he has a similar advantage.

"My work as clerk of court helps me better understand the critical issues I face as chief judge, such as those dealing with the budget, personnel, and facilities," he said."I know the pressures a clerk of court faces can be unforeseen and unpredictable, and that as a clerk of court you can be held accountable for things you couldn't control."

Longstaff and Leonard are among 16 federal judges who were - or still are - clerks of court.

An informal survey indicates that Longstaff is the one of two Article III judges with such experience. The other is Senior Judge James R. Browning (Ninth Circuit), who for three years worked as the U.S. Supreme Court's clerk of court.
Leonard is one of five bankruptcy judges who once worked as clerks. The others are Bankruptcy Judges Cecelia Morris (New York Southern), Enrique Lamoutte (Puerto Rico), and Michael Kaplan (New York Western), and Chief Bankruptcy Judge David Kennedy (Tennessee Western).

Seven magistrate judges once were clerks of court. They are William Beaman (Wyoming), David Daniel (North Carolina Eastern), Jim Gallas (Ohio Northern), Beverly Stites Jones (Arkansas Western), Juliet Griffin (Tennessee Middle), and James Hodges Jr. (Iowa Northern).

Three part-time magistrate judges also work as full-time clerks of court: Magistrate Judges Bill Brownell (Maine), Robert Shemwell (Louisiana Western), and Theresa Owens (Wisconsin Western).

"The mix of administration and legal duties has been both challenging and enjoyable," Shemwell said."It adds a different aspect to the position of clerk of court; one which utilizes the legal area of our training. It also provides a great opportunity to implement efficiencies in the court, particularly in a multiple-location court such as ours."

When Longstaff began as clerk of court in 1968, the office used"virtually no automation, but today is fully electronic.

Leonard also cites the dramatic changes in automation since he became clerk of court in 1979, but said that's not the biggest change he has witnessed.

"I think decentralization has been even more powerful an agent for change than automation. It's given courts the ability to have more control and influence locally, and has made all the difference in matters such as coping with the budget, he said.

"It's been a sea change from the days when we had to ask 'Mother, may I' of Washington each time we wanted to buy a box of pencils. When I started in 1979, there was no local autonomy administratively. Decentralization changed things for the better, Leonard said.

His former post"has influenced the way I approach my work as a judge in a thousand ways, Leonard said."You have a sense every day that so much of what a court does is process, and you know what goes into making that process work.

He added:"Any judge who is a former clerk of court is always going to try to be a force for uniformity - for judges doing things the same way for administrative efficiency. When it comes to case-management techniques, I'm willing to look for consensus so we judges do things the same way."