The Student Association Court may be one of the most overlooked aspects of student government. That may change this year.
The court has the potential to be a showdown highlighting the divisions within GW’s student government. The court settles disputes involving the SA, such as constitutional issues and election appeals.
The SA constitution mandates that five judges preside over the court, but the bench is nearly empty now due to the graduation of former judges. Only two judges now sit on the bench, one of whom will be graduating in December.
Appointing students to the SA court has at times been a bitter fight between the SA president and the Senate. The president selects nominees and the Senate Rules Committee considers them. Passing the Rules Committee requires a majority vote and then the Senate must pass a nominee with a two-thirds vote for the student to be eligible to sit on the court.
Last year former SA President Audai Shakour nominated Andrew Salzman, former senator from the Graduate School of Education and Human Development, to be on the court. The veteran senator was denied the two-thirds Senate majority needed to sit on the bench. Senators, who had a history of harsh criticism toward Shakour and his executive branch, said he was unqualified.
This year, SA President Lamar Thorpe, a senior, and the Senate will attempt to pass four new members to the student court. The Senate is dominated by one pseudo-political party – Real GW – and Thorpe is not a part of that group, which means the court’s nomination process could mirror the nomination debacle from last year, four times over.
In an effort to run the nomination process smoothly, Thorpe has created the Student Court Committee. The group, headed by Rules Committee chair Chris Rotella (CCAS-U), will make nomination recommendations for Thorpe to consider.
According to the SA constitution, two of the members of the court must be undergraduate students and two must be graduate students. Currently, the court consists of Chief Judge Christina Vamvas, a graduate student, and Judge Oliver Tobias, a senior who will be graduating in December.
The Student Court Committee had its first meeting Monday and will distribute applications for students interested in becoming judges. Rotella said that there is “no one specific quality” that the committee will be looking for in applicants.
“We need students with a mix of experience and legal knowledge,” Rotella said. “We also need students that are fresh, but understand jurisprudence.”
The Rules Committee will also play an integral role in considering Thorpe’s nominees for vice president positions within the SA. Thorpe nominates students to sit in his cabinet who, like court nominees, have to pass through the Rules Committee and the Senate.
Last year, the Senate voted down three of Thorpe’s vice president nominees and Thorpe said he will re-nominate two of the candidates that failed last year.
