Hawaii Bar ratings should be transparent

The Hawaii State Bar Association deemed Circuit Judge Michael Wilson unqualified for the state Supreme Court, but the greater taint has fallen on the legal group.

Its secretive ratings process leaves Wilson, the Hawaii senators who must decide whether or not to confirm him, and the general public in the dark about what, exactly, the association found wanting especially given that it had rated Wilson favorably twice before.

The Senate Judiciary and Labor Committee, by contrast, gave Wilson a unanimous vote of confidence in moving his nomination along to the full Senate, and in the course of its hearing on the matter enlightened the public to serious flaws in the HSBA’s rating system.

Testifying at Thursday’s hearing, the association’s president-elect did not explain why the HSBA’s board of directors considered Wilson "unqualified" and did not disclose the breakdown of the vote against him.

The board had interviewed Wilson and collected feedback about him from HSBA members, assuring the lawyers that their comments would be confidential, before deciding whether to endorse his ascension to Hawaii’s highest court.

But the 21-member board’s straight up-and-down vote, which may reflect unsubstantiated rumors, is patently unfair. The American Bar Association, a national group, provides a much better model, as it gives specific reasons whenever it deems judicial nominees unqualified.

The HSBAdefends its process as ensuring candor from its members, but the substantive basis of a nominee’s rating easily could be disclosed without impeding such candor.

The Senate committee therefore was correct to reject the association’s conclusion about Wilson, but that does not relieve senators of vetting the nominee fully themselves.

Although he personally endorsed Wilson along with the rest of the committee, Judiciary Chairman Clayton Hee was prudent to delay a confirmation vote by the full Senate until later this month.

If there are legitimate, on-the-record complaints about Wilson’s fitness for the post, that should be enough time for them to emerge and for Wilson to properly defend himself.

It’s not as if he’s an unknown; Wilson’s long career in public service includes stints as the director of the state Department of Land and Natural Resources and as the state consumer advocate and 14 years on the Circuit Court bench.

The goal of any confirmation process is not to sweep potentially disqualifying information under the rug, but to address concerns fairly for everyone involved.

Unfortunately, it’s too late for Wilson to truly be treated fairly. The HSBA’s vague, secretive ratings system has deprived him of that. Wilson will carry the stain of an "unqualified" rating even if eventually confirmed to the five-member state Supreme Court for a 10-year-term.

It’s not enough to say that Wilson knew what he was getting into; public servants should expect scrutiny, but not character assassination.

The mission of the Hawaii State Bar Association is to unite and inspire Hawaii’s lawyers to promote justice, serve the public and improve the legal profession. It has not accomplished that during this sorry spectacle, and should quickly make its rating system more transparent or risk becoming irrelevant in a judicial selection process that is vitally important to every person in this state.