Martha Walters

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Martha L. Walters
Image of Martha L. Walters

Nonpartisan

Prior offices
Oregon Supreme Court Position 7
Successor: Bronson James

Education

Bachelor's

University of Michigan, 1972

Law

University of Oregon School of Law, 1977

Contact

Personal LinkedIn 

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Martha L. Walters was a judge for Position 7 of the Oregon Supreme Court. She assumed office in 2006. She left office on January 1, 2023.

Walters won re-election for the Position 7 judge of the Oregon Supreme Court outright in the primary on May 19, 2020, after the general election was canceled.

Walters previously served as chief justice of the court. She was elected by her peers as chief justice on July 2, 2018, to succeed Chief Justice Thomas Balmer, becoming the first woman to preside over the state's highest court.[1]

She was first appointed to the court by Governor Ted Kulongoski (D) in 2006. She was subsequently elected by voters in a nonpartisan election in 2008, 2014, and 2020. On October 18, 2022, Walters announced she would retire on December 31, 2022.[2][3][4] To read more about judicial selection in Oregon, click here.

In 2020, Ballotpedia published Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship, a study examining the partisan affiliation of all state supreme court justices in the country. As part of this study, we assigned each justice a Confidence Score describing our confidence in the degree of partisanship exhibited by the justices' past partisan behavior, before they joined the court.[5] Walters received a confidence score of Mild Democrat.[6] Click here to read more about this study.

Biography

Walters received a B.A. from the University of Michigan in 1972 and a J.D. from the University of Oregon School of Law in 1977.[3] Prior to joining the Oregon Supreme Court, she worked as an attorney with Walters Romm Chanti & Dickens, P.C. from 1985 to 2006 and with Harrang, Swanson, Long & Wilkinson, P.C. from 1977 to 1985.[3] She was a former member of the Federal Bar Association, and a fellow of the American Bar Foundation.[3]

Elections

2020

See also: Oregon Supreme Court elections, 2020

Nonpartisan primary election

Nonpartisan primary for Oregon Supreme Court Position 7

Incumbent Martha L. Walters won election outright in the primary for Oregon Supreme Court Position 7 on May 19, 2020.

Candidate
%
Votes
✔
Image of Martha L. Walters
Martha L. Walters (Nonpartisan)
 
98.7
 
828,329
 Other/Write-in votes
 
1.3
 
10,625

Incumbents are bolded and underlined. The results have been certified. Source

Total votes: 838,954
Candidate Connection = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey.

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2014

See also: Oregon judicial elections, 2014

Walters ran for re-election to the Oregon Supreme Court.
Primary: She was elected without opposition in the primary on May 20, 2014.
[4]

2008

Walters was re-elected to the supreme court after running unopposed.[4]

Analysis

Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship (2020)

See also: Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship and Ballotpedia Courts: Determiners and Dissenters

Last updated: June 15, 2020

In 2020, Ballotpedia published Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship, a study examining the partisan affiliation of all state supreme court justices in the country as of June 15, 2020.

The study presented Confidence Scores that represented our confidence in each justice's degree of partisan affiliation. This was not a measure of where a justice fell on an ideological spectrum, but rather a measure of how much confidence we had that a justice was or had been affiliated with a political party. The scores were based on seven factors, including but not limited to party registration.[7]

The five resulting categories of Confidence Scores were:

  • Strong Democrat
  • Mild Democrat
  • Indeterminate[8]
  • Mild Republican
  • Strong Republican

This justice's Confidence Score, as well as the factors contributing to that score, is presented below. The information below was current as of June 2020.

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Martha
Walters

Oregon

  • Partisan Confidence Score:
    Mild Democrat
  • Judicial Selection Method:
    Elected
  • Key Factors:
    • Was a registered Democrat as of 2020
    • Donated less than $2,000 to Democratic candidates
    • Appointed by a Democratic governor


Partisan Profile

Details:

Walters was a registered Democrat as of 2020. She donated $500 to Democratic candidates. She was appointed by Gov. Ted Kulongoski (D) to fill a vacancy.

Other Scores:

In a 2012 study of campaign contributions, Walters received a campaign finance score of -0.6, indicating a liberal ideological leaning.


Bonica and Woodruff campaign finance scores (2012)

See also: Bonica and Woodruff campaign finance scores of state supreme court justices, 2012

In October 2012, political science professors Adam Bonica and Michael Woodruff of Stanford University attempted to determine the partisan ideology of state supreme court justices. They created a scoring system in which a score above 0 indicated a more conservative-leaning ideology, while scores below 0 were more liberal.

Walters received a campaign finance score of -0.6, indicating a liberal ideological leaning. This was less liberal than the average score of -1.00 that justices received in Oregon.

The study was based on data from campaign contributions by the judges themselves, the partisan leaning of those who contributed to the judges' campaigns, or, in the absence of elections, the ideology of the appointing body (governor or legislature). This study was not a definitive label of a justice, but an academic summary of various relevant factors.[9]

Campaign themes

2020

Ballotpedia survey responses

See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection

Martha L. Walters did not complete Ballotpedia's 2020 Candidate Connection survey.

Noteworthy cases

Tobacco damages ruling

In 2010, Walters authored the unanimous ruling which found tobacco company Philip Morris did not have to pay $100 million to the family of a smoker who died of cancer after smoking low-tar cigarettes. The court ordered the Multnomah County court to reconsider the punitive damages award, after the supreme court found the judge improperly instructed the jury.[10]

Statute of limitations in sex abuse cases

Justice Walters wrote the court's opinion in a March 2008 case that questioned the state's statute of limitations in sexual abuse cases. The unanimous decision reversed the ruling by the Oregon Court of Appeals.[11]

State supreme court judicial selection in Oregon

See also: Judicial selection in Oregon

The seven justices on the Oregon Supreme Court are selected through nonpartisan elections.[12] Judges' terms begin on the first Monday in January following their election.[13]

Judges serve six-year terms. Judges seeking to serve more than one term must stand for re-election.[12]

Qualifications

To serve on this court, a judge must be:

  • a U.S. citizen;
  • a state resident for at least three years;
  • a state bar member; and
  • under the age of 75.[12]

Chief justice

The chief justice is selected by peer vote and serves in that capacity for a six-year term.

Vacancies

See also: How vacancies are filled in state supreme courts

If a midterm vacancy occurs on the court, the governor appoints a replacement. The appointee serves until the next general election occurring 61 or more days after the vacancy, at which point he or she may run for election.[12] The map below highlights how vacancies are filled in state supreme courts across the country.



See also

Oregon Judicial Selection More Courts
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Courts in Oregon
Oregon Court of Appeals
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Elections: 2024 • 2023 • 2022 • 2021 • 2020 • 2019 • 2018 • 2017
Gubernatorial appointments
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External links

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Personal

  • LinkedIn
    		•

    Footnotes

    1. ↑ The Lewiston Tribune, "Walters sworn in as first woman chief justice of the Oregon Supreme Court," July 6, 2018
    2. ↑ OPB, "Oregon’s Supreme Court Chief Justice announces retirement," October 18, 2022
    3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 Oregon Judicial Department, "Biography - Chief Justice Martha L. Walters," accessed June 30, 2021
    4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Oregon Secretary of State, "Election History," accessed June 30, 2021
    5. ↑ We calculated confidence scores by collecting several data points such as party registration, donations, and previous political campaigns.
    6. ↑ The five possible confidence scores were: Strong Democrat, Mild Democrat, Indeterminate, Mild Republican, and Strong Republican.
    7. ↑ The seven factors were party registration, donations made to partisan candidates, donations made to political parties, donations received from political parties or bodies with clear political affiliation, participation in political campaigns, the partisanship of the body responsible for appointing the justice, and state trifecta status when the justice joined the court.
    8. ↑ An Indeterminate score indicates that there is either not enough information about the justice’s partisan affiliations or that our research found conflicting partisan affiliations.
    9. ↑ Stanford University, "State Supreme Court Ideology and 'New Style' Judicial Campaigns," October 31, 2012
    10. ↑ Law.com, "Oregon Supreme Court Tosses Out $100 Million in Punitives Against Philip Morris," June 28, 2010
    11. ↑ The Dalles Chronicle, "Supreme court rules against city on abuse," March 14, 2008
    12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 12.2 12.3 American Judicature Society, "Methods of Judicial Selection: Oregon," archived October 3, 2014
    13. ↑ Oregon State Legislature, "Oregon Constitution," accessed August 29, 2014


    Oregon courts

    Federal courts:

    Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals • U.S. District Court: District of Oregon • U.S. Bankruptcy Court: District of Oregon

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    Oregon Supreme Court • Oregon Court of Appeals • Oregon Circuit Courts • Oregon Tax Court • Oregon County Courts • Oregon Justice Courts • Oregon Municipal Courts

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    Courts in Oregon • Oregon judicial elections • Judicial selection in Oregon

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