A bold, new vision is needed for North Carolina's judicial system. There is growing public discontent with our current judicial system, drawn from real-life bad experiences dealing with the system, which too often resembles the convoluted entrails of England's Chancery Court of 1853, as painstakingly depicted in Charles Dickens' "Bleak House" through the interminable fictional case of Jarndyce and Jarndyce.
Improvement of our court system should be a bipartisan issue. Almost a decade has passed since the Futures Commission proposed a detailed plan to revitalize the system to meet current needs (at that time). Tediously slow, miniscule steps to implement its proposals have seeped out of the legislature instead of the giant leaps needed. The meager continued funding of our third branch of government, with less than 3 percent of our state budget, reveals the lack of priority and focus that the legislature devotes to the judicial system.
Money is only one prong of the solution. A fundamental structural overhaul of the system itself is essential.
Our court system operates under an old model that better served a less urbanized state in an earlier time. The following steps would begin to bring the system into the 21st century:
* Immediately establish a statewide family court to provide the services desperately needed for families in crisis. This was recommended long ago by the Futures Commission. Experimental programs have sprouted across the state with successful results. The time-consuming delay of adopting a constitutional amendment to create a new court could be avoided by establishing the Family Court as a separate division of Superior Court, as has been done in Georgia.
* Expand the duties of magistrates to assume many of the time-consuming functions of trial court judges such as child support enforcement and civil domestic violence restraining orders. This would free up judges to handle more extensive trial matters expeditiously.
* Eliminate the right to double dipping trials, which provide more than one shot at the apple -- more than one trial of the same issue. For example, magistrate cases are appealable for trial de novo by District Court judges, and drunken driving cases are appealable to Superior Court judges for a second trial. Having two trials of the same case is wasteful of funds and time.
* Establish a "plain English jury instruction project" to revise all pattern jury instructions and eliminate the arcane language of present instructions, which leave jurors' eyes gazed over with lack of understanding and guidance about applying the law and reaching a proper verdict.
* Adequately fund and staff the court system, not only with enough judges and prosecutors but with proper support staff including law clerks, psychological evaluation resources and secretarial assistance. To attract and retain high-quality staff, salaries must be increased to an acceptable level. The disparity in state court salaries and appropriate range of compensation is exemplified by the fact that the lowest federal judge, a federal magistrate judge, is paid substantially more than our state's highest judge, the chief justice of the state Supreme Court.
North Carolina's tradition as being a beacon of progress in the New South requires a judicial system worthy of such aspirations. Fiscal responsibility and progressive reform are not inconsistent. The legislature can seize the initiative to strengthen our judicial system. A spirit of thoughtful innovation and progressive action can quickly move North Carolina into a position of national leadership in providing a model judicial system to meet the needs of its citizens.
Judge Bill Constangy is a five-term District Court judge in Mecklenburg County.