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Dawn H. Beam
Dawn H. Beam was a judge for District 2-Place 2 of the Mississippi Supreme Court. She assumed office on February 15, 2016. She left office on January 5, 2025.
Beam ran for re-election for the District 2-Place 2 judge of the Mississippi Supreme Court. She lost in the general election on November 5, 2024.
Gov. Phil Bryant (R) announced Beam's appointment to the Mississippi Supreme Court on December 28, 2015. She succeeded Randy Pierce, who resigned in February 2016.[1][2] Beam was elected to a full eight-year term in November 2016. To read more about judicial selection in Mississippi, 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.[3] Beam received a confidence score of Mild Republican.[4] Click here to read more about this study.
Biography
Beam received her B.A. from the University of Mississippi in 1986 and her J.D. from the University of Mississippi School of Law in 1989. Following more than a decade of private practice, Beam worked for three years as a county prosecutor in Lamar County and for five years as a chancellor of the 10th Chancery District.[5][6]
Elections
2024
See also: Mississippi Supreme Court elections, 2024
General election
General election for Mississippi Supreme Court District 2 Position 2
David Sullivan defeated incumbent Dawn H. Beam in the general election for Mississippi Supreme Court District 2 Position 2 on November 5, 2024.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | David Sullivan (Nonpartisan) | 54.6 | 206,216 |
 | Dawn H. Beam (Nonpartisan) | 45.4 | 171,625 | |
| Total votes: 377,841 | |||
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Endorsements
Ballotpedia did not identify endorsements for Beam in this election.
2016
- See also: Mississippi judicial elections, 2016
| Mississippi Supreme Court, District 2, Place 2, 2016 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Candidate | Vote % | Votes |
 Dawn Beam Incumbent |
67.32% | 216,809 |
| Michael Shareef | 32.68% | 105,266 |
| Total Votes (634 of 641 precincts reporting: 99%) | 322,075 | |
| Source: The New York Times | ||
2015
Gov. Phil Bryant (R) appointed Beam to the Mississippi Supreme Court on December 28, 2015, to replace Randy Pierce.[1] She assumed office on February 15, 2016.
2014
- See also: Mississippi judicial elections, 2014
Beam won re-election to the 10th Chancery District. She was unopposed in the general election on November 4, 2014. [7]
2010
- See also: Mississippi judicial elections, 2010
Beam defeated Scott Phillips in the runoff election for the 10th Chancery District in 2010.[8]
Analysis
Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship (2020)
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.[9]
The five resulting categories of Confidence Scores were:
- Strong Democrat
- Mild Democrat
- Indeterminate[10]
- 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.
Dawn
Beam
Mississippi
- Partisan Confidence Score:
Mild Republican - Judicial Selection Method:
Elected - Key Factors:
- Appointed by a Republican governor
- State was a Republican trifecta at time of appointment
Partisan Profile
Details:
Beam was appointed by Gov. Phil Bryant (R). At the time of her appointment, Mississippi was a Republican trifecta.
State supreme court judicial selection in Mississippi
- See also: Judicial selection in Mississippi
The nine justices on the Mississippi Supreme Court are elected to eight-year terms in nonpartisan elections. All candidates must run in the general election (as Mississippi holds no primary for judicial candidates) and must face re-election if they wish to serve again.[11] For more information about these elections, visit the Mississippi judicial elections page.
Unlike most states, supreme court justices in Mississippi are elected to represent specific districts. The nine justices are divided among three supreme court districts (not to be confused with the 22 divisions of the circuit courts) and are voted into office by the residents of their respective regions.[12] Only the states of Illinois, Kentucky, and Louisiana use a similar system.
Qualifications
To serve on this court, a judge must be:
- a qualified elector for and from the district in which election is sought;
- a minimum of 30 years old;
- a practicing attorney; and
- a state citizen for at least five years.[11]
Chief justice
The court's chief justice is selected by seniority. He or she serves until retirement when the justice with the next most judicial experience becomes chief.[11]
Vacancies
If a midterm vacancy occurs on the court, a temporary judge is named by the governor. Appointees serve out the remainder of their predecessor's unexpired term if four or fewer years of the term remain. If there are more than four years remaining, the appointee will run in the next general election, taking place nine months or more after the vacancy occurs. The winner of the election will serve the remainder of the term.[13]
The map below highlights how vacancies are filled in state supreme courts across the country.
See also
2024 Elections
External links
|
Candidate Mississippi Supreme Court District 2 Position 2 |
Personal |
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 WAPT News, "Bryant names Lamar County judge Beam to state Supreme Court," December 28, 2015
- ↑ Clarion Ledger, "Bryant Appoints Dawn Beam to Miss. Supreme Court," accessed December 29, 2015
- ↑ We calculated confidence scores by collecting several data points such as party registration, donations, and previous political campaigns.
- ↑ The five possible confidence scores were: Strong Democrat, Mild Democrat, Indeterminate, Mild Republican, and Strong Republican.
- ↑ State of Mississippi Judiciary, "Dawn H. Beam," accessed July 27, 2021
- ↑ 10th District Chancery Court, "Chancellor Dawn H. Beam," accessed July 27, 2021
- ↑ Mississippi Secretary of State, "2014 Candidate Qualifying List," accessed June 9, 2014
- ↑ Mississippi Secretary of State, "2010 General Election Runoff Results: Lamar," accessed July 27, 2021
- ↑ 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.
- ↑ 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.
- ↑ 11.0 11.1 11.2 National Center for State Courts, "Methods of Judicial Selection," accessed September 7, 2021
- ↑ State of Mississippi Judiciary, "Supreme Court," accessed September 7, 2021
- ↑ National Center for State Courts, "Methods of Judicial Selection," accessed September 7, 2021
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by - |
Mississippi Supreme Court District 2 Position 2 2016-2025 |
Succeeded by David Sullivan |
| ||||||||||
