In Print: Volume 88: Number 6
Judicial Recruitment and Promotion: Responses to Professors Ramseyer and Repeta
By Shen-Ichi Nishikawa
88 Wash. U. L. Rev. 1765 (2011)
(PDF)
On September 11, 2010, I received an e-mail from a graduate of my seminar. He passed the entrance examination to the Shiho Kensyujo (Legal Training and Research Institute, or LTRI). The Ministry of Justice (Homusho) had announced the results two days prior. He and I are both graduates of Meiji University. Because of Professor Ramseyer’s Article, I will not advise the graduate to be a judge. I do not think that he could be on his way up the ladder as a judge. He did not attend the University of Tokyo.
Recently, I published my book Saibankan Kambujinji no Kenkyu (Research on Personnel Management of Senior Judges in Japan). In this book, I pointed out that many judges who attended the University of Tokyo have served as chief judges of the district courts, family courts, or both, and have become presidents of the high courts. The ratio is 18.0%. In the case of judges who graduated from private universities, however, the ratio is just 2.1%. In my book, I could not explain this gap well. Had I read Professor Ramseyer’s Article while writing my book, I would have been able to explain the gap more clearly.
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