Supreme Court candidates Judy Cates, Democrat, and David Overstreet, Republican, who inhabit a world of argument, didn’t argue in a remote debate on Sept. 16.
They followed a statewide code of polite conduct in judicial campaigns, though they disagreed a bit about how tightly that code fits.
The separation of the candidates and their isolation from their audience robbed the event of half its value by the standard of stage and seats.
Cates and Overstreet work together as Fifth District appellate court judges.
They vie for one of seven seats on the Illinois Supreme Court, with the winner of the Nov. 3 election replacing Justice Lloyd Karmeier, who is retiring after 16 years in the seat.
Sponsored by the Illinois State Bar Association and Appellate Lawyers Association, ISBA president Dennis Orsey of Granite City said in opening that the bar highly recommended both candidates.
In describing his foray into the judiciary, Overstreet said it was former Judge James Wexstten’s appointment to the Fifth District Appellate Court that created a vacancy for circuit judge.
He said he applied and Karmeier appointed him.
“I handled every kind of docket” at the trial court level, Overstreet said.
In her opening, Cates said her mom taught and her dad had a business on Main Street in Belleville.
She said she was in the first group at Belleville East, and went on to Cornell University.
She said she came back to marry her junior prom date Darrell. She said he put her through law school at Washington University.
As then state’s attorney, Clyde Kuehn hired her for juvenile court.
“I saw the worst of the worst,” Cates said.
She said she wanted to do personal injury but no one would hire a woman for that – until an angel landed on her shoulder. Rex Carr’s firm hired her, “and I became a great trial lawyer.”
Cates served as president of the Illinois Trial Lawyers Association (2006-07), the only female president, she noted, for a group that started in 1952.
She said she doesn’t lean left or right.
“I’ve represented people who have lost limbs,” she said. "I’m ready. I understand the people.”
Overstreet said, “It’s not my job to pick winners and losers. My job is to uphold the law.”
He said juvenile court was the most challenging part of his job as circuit judge.
He said the hardest decisions were sentencing and custody.
On a question of diversity, Overstreet said he tries to treat people right.
“People want to see judges that are like them to a degree,” he said.
He said he was honored to work with Fifth District Justice Milton Wharton.
Last year Karmeier appointed Wharton, a former St. Clair County judge, as the Fifth District’s first black judge.
Cates said that a report in 2017 found inherent bias in Illinois courts.
“I haven’t had any training from that study,” she said.
She said she would ask the court administration office for training on it.
She said that Wharton was retired, and he and Karmeier were good friends.
“There wasn’t any current African-American that could have been appointed?” she said.
She said Karmeier appointed 44 judges, all white, and six of them women.
To a question about raising the profile of judicial elections, Cates said the case of Minnesota vs. White set a code of ethics that a candidate could give opinions.
She said the Illinois Judges Association now says they could, and she urged her audience to read it.
“We need to tell people what we’re about,” she said.
She said Overstreet said he’s running as a conservative.
“What does that mean, conservative?” she said. “I don’t know.”
Overstreet said, “I’m a constitutional conservative, small c’s.”
“I would apply the law as written, not make policy decisions, not decide on my own opinion.”
He said the Minnesota case didn’t strike down the canon on speech.
He said candidates shouldn’t make statements that commit or appear to commit them to any decision.
Cates said, “I’m not giving statements on cases.”
“I own a gun,” she said. “I don’t think I’m prohibited from saying that.”
Early voting begins in Illinois on Sept. 24.