In separate hearings yesterday, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted to advance Governor Murphy’s nominations of Judge Fasciale and Rachel Wainer Apter to the Supreme Court. They would fill the seats that became vacant when Justices LaVecchia and Fernandez-Vina retired. Judge Fasciale would fill the later seat and Ms. Wainer Apter the former. The Judiciary Committee voted unanimously in favor of Judge Fasciale’s nomination. The vote on Ms. Wainer Apter was 8-3, with all of the Committee’s Democrats and Sen. Jon Bramnick (R-Union) voting in favor. Three other Republican...

Following this post about Justice Fernandez-Vina’s retirement earlier today, Chief Justice Rabner this afternoon issued the following statement, available here: “Under the State Constitution and the rules of the Court, the Chief Justice has discretion to assign the Appellate Division judge who is senior in length of service to serve temporarily in the Supreme Court. See N.J. Const. art. VI, § 2, ¶ 1; R. 2:13-2(a). Since the adoption of the 1947 Constitution, Governors have abided by the tradition that no more than four members of the Supreme Court can be affiliated with a single...

Yesterday, Justice Fernandez-Vina turned seventy years old. That is the mandatory retirement age for judges, which Justice O’Hern, for whom I clerked, referred to as “the age of constitutional senility.” Accordingly, Justice Fernandez-Vina’s service on the Supreme Court has come to an end. Governor Murphy has not nominated anyone to take Justice Fernandez-Vina’s seat. If Chief Justice Rabner opts to fill that seat temporarily by promoting an Appellate Division judge, as was done when Judge Fuentes was tapped to fill the seat vacated by Justice LaVecchia (a...