Free speech shouldn't be a weapon against judicial independence

I fear that your recent article ("SF DA calls former judge's bar complaint attempt to curtail free speech") either unintentionally misguides your readers away from the point of retired Judge LaDoris Cordell's reported State Bar complaint or intentionally attempts to cast San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins' responsive social media campaign as the latest episode in some sort of ongoing quarrel.

Judge Cordell's reported complaint acknowledges that she has no personal relationship with Jenkins, focusing only on the claim that  Jenkins' repeated public unwarranted criticism of a number of San Francisco County judges lies not in any identified judicial error but only on the fact that she doesn't like it when their lawful decisions differ from what her office hoped to see in cases in which they regularly appear as a litigating party. Such public judicial criticism is repeated and pursued not because it serves any legitimate legal purpose (that is what thoughtful appellate review is for), but solely to publicly ascribe condemnation to a judge or judges when rulings do not go her way.

Of course,  Jenkins has her First Amendment right to the free speech that she claims is somehow under attack by the reported State Bar complaint. However, as an elected public officer of the court, Jenkins should be especially sensitive to how essential it is that she consider the consequences of when and under what circumstances that right is exercised. Social media posts are not how disagreements with lawful judicial decisions are legitimately resolved. At a time when all of us are depending more than ever upon an independent judiciary to protect cornerstone principles of our liberty and those sworn to uphold them, the reading public would benefit most from informed stories of how that fundamental need can be best protected.