Dave Larson has the bench experience and civic commitment to be a strong Supreme Court justice.
VOTERS should welcome the chance to add new voices to the court and elect Dave Larson over incumbent state Supreme Court Justice Charlie Wiggins.
Larson has the trial, bench and civic experience to be a strong justice. He is the presiding judge of Federal Way Municipal Court — comparable experience to Chief Justice Barbara Madsen, who was a Seattle Municipal Court judge when she ran for Supreme Court.
As a judge, he has adjudicated thousands of cases since his appointment to the bench in 2008, pushed for innovative reforms and earned deep community respect.
Supreme court picks reflect paramount duties
The state Supreme Court is front and center in one of Washington’s most important issues arguably since the state’s founding in 1889: the state’s persistent underfunding of basic education over decades. That’s why voters should pay attention to the three races they will find languishing near the bottom of their general-election ballot in November. The Seattle Times editorial board interviewed the incumbents and their challengers, as well as dozens of others, including judges, lawyers, prosecutors, professors and state officials from around the state. Today, we offer these recommendations.The Times recommends:
Barbara Madsen
Supreme Court Position 5
Strengths: Led the court on education-funding rulings
Madsen is the better candidate for a term in which the McCleary case and its potential remedies — both judicial and legislative — will dominate. Voters should re-elect her. ..."
The Times recommends:
Dave Larson
Supreme Court Position 6
Strengths: Trial, bench and civic experience; a strong, credible challenge to the court
Larson presents a strong, credible challenge to a court that has at times veered off course. He deserves a six-year term to the state Supreme Court. ..."
The Times recommends:
Mary Yu
Supreme Court Position 1
Strengths: Bipartisan support; supports racial-justice causes
Yu contends McCleary is not an example of judicial activism. She said the court was presented with a legal question — to interpret what it means to amply provide for education and whether it’s the state’s paramount duty. ..."
As the former president of the Federal Way School Board, Larson championed an unsuccessful education-funding lawsuit that was a precursor to the state Supreme Court’s McCleary ruling.
His sophisticated policy understanding of education issues would be a vital addition to the court as it now confronts Washington’s decades-long pattern of foisting the state obligation to fully fund schools onto local school levies.
Larson differs with Wiggins on the remedies. Larson says he would have not voted with a 7-2 majority of the Supreme Court in 2012 to retain jurisdiction of the McCleary case, which gives the court ongoing oversight. He also criticizes the court for its ineffective $100,000-a-day sanction levied in 2015 on the Legislature for failing to comply. Larson has a nuanced and informed view of the lawsuit and would be a moderating voice on the court as it enters the final phase of the McCleary case.
Wiggins, a Bainbridge Island lawyer elected to the court in 2010, has been a workhorse justice. But the former appellate attorney’s writings on criminal-justice cases are often impractical — Larson rightly calls them “unworkable.”
In one recent case, a detective investigating a child-pornography case accepted a suspect’s invitation to come into the suspect’s home so a formal consent-to-search authorization could be signed. Wiggins, writing for the majority, found that entering the house to get the paperwork signed amounted to an unlawful warrantless search. He dismissed the charges.
In another case, Wiggins, writing in dissent, argued for dismissing domestic-violence charges because the victim did not show up at trial — ignoring the fact that the batterer had shot at her home, slashed her tires and threatened her from jail.
Larson presents a strong, credible challenge to a court that has at times veered off course. He deserves a six-year term to the state Supreme Court.