Court funding

The president of the Missouri Bar Association, accompanied by judges and lawyers, made a compelling case last week regarding state funding for Missouri's judicial system. If the state's courts have to take a 10 percent budget cut, said Bill Corrigan Jr. of St. Louis, criminal trials would be less speedy and civil lawsuits would be bogged down.

The judiciary has been cooperative with state budgeteers who have had to look for ways to squeeze a huge shopping list into a limited shopping bag while avoiding overdrafts in the state's checking account. Over the past two years of tight state budgets, the judiciary has seen its funding cut by $10 million. Overall, the cost of the judiciary -- one of three branches of government along with the legislative and executive branches -- has been modest. In 1985, the budget for the entire state court system was 2.09 percent of total state spending. This year it is 1.66 percent, or $160.8 million. (The legislative budget is 0.46 percent of the total state budget, and the executive branch uses 0.61 percent.)

While the Missouri bar has done its homework and is well-prepared to fend off attempts to further reduce state spending on the court system, it appears the well-stocked arsenal may not be needed. Gov. Bob Holden's proposed budget calls for almost $6 million in additional funding for the judiciary, which is about half of the almost $12 million of extra funding the courts requested.

So why is the bar association traveling around Missouri making a pitch for the court budget? Because all state-funded agencies were asked last fall to submit cuts that would have to be made if the state budget imposed a 10 percent across-the-board budget reduction -- a worst-case scenario.

As it turns out, the state court system may benefit not only from budget increases this year, but there also may be cost savings from a proposed streamlining of court operations.

One recommendation is to do away with the requirement that each of the state's 114 counties have an associate circuit judge. The idea is that sparsely populated counties where fewer cases are filed could share a judge.

The administration of justice across Missouri is generally in good shape, thanks to the judges, clerks and other court officials who work hard to keep up with caseloads. It wouldn't make sense to cut the judicial budget to the point of adversely affecting the system. But neither does it make sense to cry wolf when there appears to be little danger of funding cuts.