Patterson '80 appointed to New Jersey high court

By The Dartmouth Staff | 5/4/10 4:31pm

Courtesy Of The New Jersey Governor's Office

Anne Pat­ter­son '80, an at­tor­ney in Mor­ris County, N.J., has been ap­pointed to serve on the New Jer­sey Supreme Court by Gov. Christo­pher Christie, R-N.J., The New York Times re­ported Mon­day.

Pat­ter­son will fill the void left by cur­rent jus­tice John Wal­lace, whom Christie de­clined to reap­point -- the first in­stance in which a jus­tice has not been reap­pointed in the 63 years the court has op­er­ated under the cur­rent state con­sti­tu­tion, ac­cord­ing to The Times.

Pat­ter­son's ap­point­ment, which must be ap­proved by the De­mo­c­ra­t­i­cally-con­trolled state Sen­ate, may spark a par­ti­san bat­tle. Sev­eral De­moc­rats in the state Sen­ate came out against Pat­ter­son on Mon­day, call­ing her ap­point­ment po­lit­i­cally mo­ti­vated, ac­cord­ing to New Jer­sey News­room.

Pat­ter­son is a part­ner at the law firm of Riker Danzig, based in Mor­ris­town, N.J. She has served as spe­cial as­sis­tant to the state At­tor­ney Gen­eral and deputy At­tor­ney Gen­eral, ac­cord­ing to her posted bi­og­ra­phy.