mendels.qxd
A word about my credentials. I’m a supporter of the current IVI-IPO officers. I serve on the near south chapter board and the state board of directors. I’ve been a member for 35 years, and served as state chair at the time of Harold Washington’s election as mayor.
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At the beginning of the article Felshman quotes from Meites’s Reader ad to the effect that 25 to 50 percent of IVI-IPO-endorsed judicial candidates in the 1996 primary were found unqualified by both the Chicago Bar Association and the Chicago Council of Lawyers. He quotes the statement without comment as to its accuracy, but in the context of everything he writes about our judicial endorsements further along in the article he clearly believes it.
Now, to explain our judicial endorsement procedures: the main push to set up the subdistricts came from the Black Caucus in the Illinois House of Representatives. It was Representative Anthony Young who spoke to our board to ask for our support of the bill. We had always favored a merit system of judicial appointment, but in the absence of such we approved the idea of switching from county-wide slates, where the voters were utterly lost for guidance, to election by districts. This would also foster minority representation, always one of our cardinal goals.
Saul Mendelson
