Governor praises Lawrence candidates

Topeka ? Gov. Kathleen Sebelius said Friday that if she had had three positions to fill on the Kansas Supreme Court, Lawrence’s Robert Fairchild and Martha Coffman would have been appointed.

“I have had difficult choices to make,” Sebelius said in naming State District Court Judge Eric Rosen of Topeka to the state’s highest appellate court.

“Judge Fairchild and Martha Coffman are excellent. I wish I could have appointed all three of them,” Sebelius said.

Rosen, Fairchild and Coffman were the nominees sent to Sebelius by a nominating commission. The position on the seven-member court was open because of the death in March of Robert Gernon of Lawrence.

Sebelius said Rosen, 52, was her choice because of his combination of experience as a judge, lawyer, mediator and community worker.

Division one district court judge Robert Fairchild was one of three finalists for the Kansas Supreme Court. He is pictured Thursday afternoon in his district courtroom.

Rosen has been a district court judge since 1993, and before that he practiced law and served as a prosecutor and public defender. He has worked as a mediator and served on several criminal justice boards, including the Kansas Sentencing Commission.

It was while a member of the Sentencing Commission that Rosen advocated for the eventual passage of a bill that focused on providing drug treatment instead of incarceration for certain offenders.

Sebelius has also known Rosen, his wife Libby and their four sons for years. The two families have lived in the same upscale Topeka neighborhood, and some of their children went through public school together. Rosen is a registered Democrat.

Fairchild had been appointed district court judge in 1996 by then-Gov. Bill Graves. Coffman has been a private lawyer and is on the advisory counsel to the Kansas Corporation Commission.

Fairchild and Coffman couldn’t be reached for comment Friday afternoon.

In an interview earlier in the week, Fairchild said that in a time when judges often come under attack, a Supreme Court justice needed to be involved with the public and to spread information about the role of the judicial branch.

“You’ve got to be willing to go to the Kiwanis Club. You’ve got to be willing to go to the Rotary,” he said.

Judges “must be as visible as they can and involved as they can so people get to know them as human beings.”

Fairchild said it’s important for Supreme Court justices to talk with the public about the reasons for having appointed judges instead of elected judges, the relationship between the judicial branch and other branches of government and the state’s constitution as a “flexible, living” document.

Fairchild said he was honored to be considered for the court job and to see how many of his friends and colleagues wrote to the governor on his behalf.

“It’s an honor to be a district judge, believe me,” he said.