End of an Era

Rotation of Post Challenged AFTER 25 YEARS of service on the NH Supreme Court, including the last 17 as chief justice, David A. Brock has announced that he will retire effective Dec. 31. Brock, 67, said that the "time is right" for his retirement. "I love my work as a judge and it has been a tremendous privilege for me to serve our state for so many years. Retiring is not easy, but I am confident about my decision....The Supreme Court and Judicial Branch are strong," he wrote in a letter posted on the judicial branch Web site at www.courts.state.nh.us.

Under a law enacted by the Legislature in 2001, Brock will be replaced as chief justice by the senior member of the court, John T. Broderick, Jr. Broderick will serve as chief justice for a five-year term, after which the next senior associate justice would assume the role of chief. However, Gov. Craig Benson has asked the NH Attorney General’s Office to seek an advisory opinion from the Supreme Court on the constitutionality of that law. Benson believes that he and the executive council should select the next chief justice, per an article of the state constitution that states, "all judicial officers…shall be nominated and appointed by the governor and council." To fill Brock’s vacant seat on the court, Benson has appointed a three-person panel composed of Rep. Henry Mock, state Sen. Sheila Roberge and lawyer Chris Reid to review potential candidates. (See sidebar.)

Brock’s Legacy

Although Brock’s tenure as chief justice was marked by the controversy of the court’s Claremont education funding decision and an impeachment trial that resulted in an acquittal by the Senate, many NH attorneys say they will instead remember the positive impact the chief justice has had on modernizing the court.

"He was instrumental in unifying the courts," said Charles A. DeGrandpre, author of the "Lex Loci" column in New Hampshire Bar Journal, who has been writing about the court’s decision-making since the mid-1960s. DeGrandpre said the unification of the superior, probate and district courts, which shifted the operation and supervision from county and local authorities to a statewide Administrative Office of the Courts under the direction of the Supreme Court, made the various courts more cohesive and led to improvements in courthouse facilities. However, DeGrandpre added that the unification may have also sowed the seeds for some of the political problems the judiciary has experienced by making it a bigger target.

DeGrandpre praised Justice Brock for the Claremont decisions and said that the justice, appointed by Gov. Meldrim Thomson, "grew to fit the responsibilities of his job."

Chuck Douglas, a Concord attorney who served as associate justice of the Supreme Court from 1977 to 1986 – starting a year before Brock joined the court – agreed that Brock’s philosophy and outlook evolved during his tenure, during which he wrote more than 800 opinions. "He was more pro-prosecution and pro-insurance at the beginning," said Douglas. "He has come to be much more protective of privacy, particularly on search and seizure issues, than in his earlier years. And he’s not someone who I would have guessed would have been involved in the Claremont opinion."

Brock’s administrative role became more controversial over time. "It became obvious that the working relationship between the court and the Legislature has deteriorated over the past few years," added Douglas.

Brock’s role as an administrator is what led to controversy and the impeachment trial of 2000, but a number of reforms to open disciplinary processes were made during his tenure.

The court also took several significant steps in 2001 to improve the way the conduct of judges is reviewed. New rules were adopted for judicial performance and evaluation; the Code of Judicial Conduct was modernized; time standards were adopted for case processing at the Supreme Court; and an Advisory Committee on Judicial Ethics was established. The court also established a Public Information Office and began a highly successful outreach program during which the justices meet in special session to hear oral argument before a student audience and answer questions about the court’s work.

When the National Center for State Court’s operational report was released in April 2002, it concluded the court had made "tremendous strides" and had "clearly moved ahead in its resolve to implement solutions and address some of the criticism it has faced."

Brock is a graduate of Dartmouth College (A.B., 1958) and the University of Michigan Law School (LLB, 1963). He served as a lieutenant in the U.S. Marine Corps between 1958 and 1961.

Prior to being appointed to the Supreme Court bench, Brock was appointed U.S. Attorney for New Hampshire by President Nixon in 1969 and served until 1972, when he ran unsuccessfully in the Republican primary for U.S. Senate. He then returned to private law practice and in 1976 was appointed to the Superior Court bench by then-Gov. Meldrim Thomson. Thomson nominated him to the Supreme Court as an associate justice in 1978, and in 1986 then-Gov. John H. Sununu named Brock to be chief justice, succeeding John King.

Superior Court Judge Harold Perkins was Brock’s law partner for four years, following Brock’s failed bid for the U.S. Senate. Judge Perkins, who remains a close personal friend of Brock’s, said he wasn’t surprised at all that Brock made it all the way to the top of the NH judiciary. "I was only surprised at how quickly it happened, but I absolutely was not surprised. Dave Brock is a fine person, very bright, with a strong sense of right and wrong, and he has always been consistent to the law. He has always called it as he sees it."

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