Griffith: Mims leads the field for high court

Outgoing Attorney General William C. Mims would be the clear front runner for a likely vacancy on the Supreme Court of Virginia now that it appears that Gov. Timothy M. Kaine will not be able to fill the seat.

That’s the opinion of House Majority Leader H. Morgan Griffith, R-Salem, who quickly threw in two qualifications to that appraisal. First, it’s not clear that Mims wants the job. He announced earlier this year that he will join the firm of Hunton & Williams LLP as a lobbyist when he leaves the AG post next month, a position where he could expect to earn far more than the $170,339 annual salary for a Supreme Court justice.

Second, “when you get into legislative dealing, anything can happen,” Griffith said.

Mims did not immediately respond to a query about his interest in the seat that would open up if the U.S. Senate confirms the appointment of Justice Barbara Milano Keenan to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Mims served as chief deputy attorney general before being elevated to the top spot when Robert F. McDonnell stepped down to campaign for governor.

Before that, Mims had served as a delegate and senator from Loudoun County and was respected and popular on both sides of the aisle. “Everybody knows him,” Griffith said of his legislative colleagues, and most have a positive view of him.

President Barack Obama nominated Keenan for the 4th Circuit seat in September, and she cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee without a dissenting vote in October. Republicans have slowed the nominating process for federal judges, and the Senate has been bogged down with proposals to change the health care system in the country and other legislative matters, but Keenan’s eventual confirmation is considered a certainty.

Kaine had anticipated faster action by the Senate and asked statewide bar groups to vet candidates so that he could fill the seat while the General Assembly was out of session.

But with the legislative session only two weeks away, selection of Keenan’s successor will fall to the General Assembly or to McDonnell if Keenan is not appointed by the end of the session or if the legislature cannot agree on the replacement.

Only seven candidates asked Kaine and bar groups to consider them for the seat after he indicated that he wanted to fill the post.

Absent from the list were several candidates, many of them with Republican connections, who had gone through the process that led to the appointments of Justice S. Bernard Goodwyn to the court in 2007 and Justice LeRoy F. Millette Jr. in 2008.

The calculus for judicial appointments shifted significantly with the election of Republican McDonnell as governor and a larger GOP contingent in the House.

The Senate remains in Democratic hands, but having McDonnell as governor strengthens the bargaining power of Republicans, just as the presence of Kaine gave Democrats extra leverage in the selection process. If both houses of the legislature can’t agree on a candidate, the selection falls to the governor.

The General Assembly has the ultimate authority in selecting judges, but it has rarely rejected a gubernatorial selection.

Griffith and Del. David B. Albo, R-Fairfax, chairman of the House Courts of Justice Committee, said they expect to ask state bar groups to vet candidates again, with the understanding that candidates who went through the process in the last three years need only express their continued interest. Mims has gone through the process and received the top rating of most bar groups.

The appointment of Mims would be a disappointment for supporters of Fairfax Circuit Judge Jane Marum Roush, who was the only candidate to receive the top rating from the eight statewide bar groups that evaluated candidates at the request of Kaine.

It also would make white males a majority of the Supreme Court for the first time in a dozen years and leave Justice Cynthia D. Kinser as the only woman on the court. The court had three women justices until Justice Elizabeth B. Lacy retired in 2007.

She was replaced by Justice Goodwyn. He and Chief Justice Leroy Rountree Hassell Sr. are black, so white men remained in the minority.

Millette replaced Justice G. Steven Agee, who went to the 4th Circuit last year. They are both white.