Las Vegas Sun

March 18, 2024

SUN EDITORIAL:

Slow pace of justice

State will feel effects of a clogged court system without new appellate court

Nevada’s court system is among the busiest in the nation, and that can present a problem for those involved. Litigants can have their cases delayed and dragged out because of the volume of cases facing the courts, and that means people spend more time and money waiting for a resolution to their issues.

As the old saying goes, justice delayed is justice denied.

Over the years, the Legislature has tried to ease the court’s burden by adding more judges in District Court. For example, nine new judges will take the bench in Clark County in January. Seven of the new judges will work on reducing a backlog of civil cases while the other two are assigned to Family Court.

The new judges are certainly a help, but the additions only address part of the situation. Appeals in Nevada go straight to state Supreme Court. It is one of only 10 states without an intermediate appellate court to help handle cases. Nevada is the largest of those states, and the workload is high. There is an average of 324 cases per Supreme Court justice. That is more than twice the number of cases per justice in Utah and New Mexico, the states closest in population to Nevada.

As Steve Kanigher reported in Tuesday’s Las Vegas Sun, not only does the workload delay cases but it also has prevented justices from writing more precedent-setting opinions that would bring uniformity to the law and help District Court judges make better decisions.

The Legislature tried to address the problem with Question 2 on this year’s ballot. The initiative would have amended the state Constitution to give the Legislature the power to create an intermediate appellate court, but it lost, 53 to 47 percent.

Justice Michael Douglas, the incoming chief justice, said there hasn’t been a decision on whether the idea should be revived. The Legislature approved the measure twice — in 2007 and 2009 — to qualify it for the ballot, and given that voters didn’t approve it, bringing it back to the Legislature for another try “might be viewed as a slap in the face to them,” Douglas said.

But before the courts and Legislature write this off, they should consider some of the reasons why the measure failed.

Court officials think it was hurt by voters’ unwillingness to approve anything that seemed to increase spending, even though the cost of an intermediate appellate court would have been minimal. As well, the initiative immediately followed the unpopular Question 1, which would have changed the way judges are selected. Under that proposal, judges would have initially been appointed and then faced subsequent retention elections. People didn’t want to give up their vote, and Question 1 may have soured them on anything regarding the courts.

The issues that Question 2 raised — improving people’s access to justice and speeding up the courts — were lost on a long ballot and hardly got noticed in an election dominated by a polarizing U.S. Senate campaign.

Considering all of that, this issue should be revived because a strong judiciary is a bedrock of American democracy. The next Legislature may be too soon to start the process of putting this on the ballot, but it’s also clear that the court’s overwhelming caseload doesn’t serve justice. The Legislature, as well as the legal community, should make a concerted effort to gain the public’s support on this issue because the work of the court affects everyone.

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