Christie's attacks on court come as no surprise [View all]

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Christie has refused to cooperate with the bar association on an agreement to review judges that he himself had signed and also attacked the unwritten custom of senatorial courtesy when it comes to home-county senators having to sign off on the governor’s nominees before they can come up for a hearing.

Critics have complained that Christie’s moves have interfered with undecided cases and put pressure on judges to behave a certain way. In two turbulent years, Christie has shown what he meant when, as a candidate, he warned he wanted to bring the court down from what he said was its pedestal.

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As recently as Feb. 9, Christie showed that attitude when he called the justices considering state funding for public schools — one of New Jersey’s biggest and longest-running legal issues — “a bunch of people on the Supreme Court who don’t know the first thing about education funding.”

Legal scholars say acrimony over state courts is not new nationwide — but it’s only recently emerged in New Jersey, at least at this sustained and prominent level. For decades, New Jersey’s court system, particularly its state Supreme Court, had been seen as a national model for its handling of legal issues and for its avoidance of partisan political interference.

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