Conflict of interest is a funny thing. Like beauty, it can often be said to rest in the eye of the beholder, and usually — if that eye is American — the beholder can be pretty generous. After all, this is the country that let Bud Selig get away with owning a baseball team and acting as commissioner for six years, and then was content to let him insist that his daughter owned the team for the next half dozen. Overall, we as a society tend to assume the best in people, or at least try to avoid seeing the worst.

There are some cases, however, in which even that becomes tough to do. Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Annette Zeigler, for example, came under scrutiny in the wake of her election to the state supreme court in 2007 for declining to recuse herself from several cases involving a bank where her husband served as director. While it was found that the cases decided while she was still a Washington County judge did not result in any direct benefit to her or her family, it was still enough to raise more than a few eyebrows, and prompt a complaint by the state ethics board. The case was eventually settled, with Zeigler admitting to violating conflict-of-interest laws and paying a fine.

Moreover, Zeigler later admitted to committing “errors in judgment” in the previous case, as well as in not removing herself from another set of cases involving companies in which she held over $50,000 worth of stock. Especially for a justice, errors in judgment are not good.

But thanks to a move last week by the Wisconsin Supreme Court, we won’t have to worry about such cases casting a stain on thecotton (the fabric of our judges’) robes of our judiciary anymore.

No, they didn’t remove Justice Zeigler.

Instead, the State Supreme Court voted to approve rules to weaken conflict of interest laws by allowing justices to hear cases involving parties that had contributed to their campaigns. In a 4-3 vote, the body finalized the rules that were adopted last fall.

Moreover, this move heralded the startling reawakening of the Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce. It, along with the Wisconsin Realtors Council, weasre responsible for drafting the rule change.

The WMC, a well-known lobbying group, has apparently decided to reenter the world of Supreme Court politics after sitting out the most recent judicial election cycle because of increased scrutiny regarding the magnitude and nature of its campaigning practices. However, no doubt motivated by a pure civic duty, the WMC, along with president Jim Haney wanted to make sure that “the mere fact you gave someone 10 bucks won’t preclude them from hearing a case.” Unfortunately, we’re rarely talking about “10 bucks.” In Zeigler’s case, the WMC spent over $2 million to get her elected, according to The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Perhaps even scarier is that the court may have made this move made in self-preservation. As state Supreme Court races have gotten more politically charged — and more expensive — the ability to court donors (pun intended) is becoming increasingly important to getting elected. And though it is unclear whether the court wishes to preserve its ability to solicit funds, or sit on cases involving donors, either scenario is equally disturbing.

Shedding some light on the motivation behind this move, Haney told The Badger Herald, “If [judges] have to disqualify themselves, half the lawyers in the state wouldn’t be allowed to represent cases.” Now I’m no poli-sci major, but I seem to recall there is a fundamental difference between lawyers and judges — one is supposed to be impartial.

But regardless of who paid attention in civics class, the main concern prompting this legislation is current judges are unable or unwilling to meet basic requirements of impartiality. The WMC should be pushing for serious judicial reform, not lowering the bar to the point where what we have doesn’t look so bad.

Should Wisconsin ever reach the point where we can’t try a mobster because he has given money to every judge in the state, perhaps then I’ll come crawling back to the WMC to eat my words, kiss their rings and repent.

Or, maybe such a scenario would indicate a dire need to reexamine our entire system of appointing judges, starting with the nearly-biannual partisan circuses referred to by special interest groups and the political elite as Supreme Court elections.

Joe Labuz ([email protected]) is a senior majoring in biomedical engineering.