Richard Neely

This page was current at the end of the individual's last campaign covered by Ballotpedia. Please contact us with any updates.

Richard Neely

Nonpartisan

Elections and appointments

Last election

June 9, 2020

Education

Bachelor's

Dartmouth College, 1964

Graduate

Yale University, 1967

Personal

Birthplace

Los Angeles, Calif.

Religion

Episcopalian

Profession

Attorney at law

Contact

Campaign website

Campaign Facebook

Personal website

Personal LinkedIn

Richard Neely ran for election for judge of the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia. He lost in the general election on June 9, 2020.

Neely completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2020. Click here to read the survey answers.

Neely passed away from liver cancer on November 8, 2020.

Biography

Neely was born in Los Angeles, California. He was a member of the United States Army from 1968 to 1969. Neely earned a bachelor's degree from Dartmouth College in January 1964 and a graduate degree from Yale University in January 1967. His professional experience included serving as a West Virginia Supreme Court Justice and as an attorney. His professional credentials include earning an LL.B. from Yale University in 1967. Neely had been associated with the American Legion, the VFW, St. Matthews Episcopal Church, Loyal Order of Moose, Sons of the Revolution, West Virginia Bar Association, and the Yale Alumni Association.

Elections

2020

See also: West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals elections, 2020

General election

General election for Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia

Incumbent Tim Armstead defeated Richard Neely and David W. Hummel Jr. in the general election for Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia on June 9, 2020.

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		Tim Armstead (Nonpartisan)	40.9	155,306
		Richard Neely (Nonpartisan)	35.8	135,938
	Submit photo	David W. Hummel Jr. (Nonpartisan)	23.3	88,263

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	Incumbents are bolded and underlined. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 379,507
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
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Campaign themes

2020

Ballotpedia survey responses

See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection

Richard Neely completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2020. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Neely's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.

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Who are you? Tell us about yourself.

Richard Neely is a former Chief Justice of the West Virginia Supreme Court and a Charleston lawyer who came originally from Fairmont. Richard is running for the Supreme Court again to restore the Court's dignity and competence. Richard is a graduate of Dartmouth College and the Yale Law School; he was awarded the Bronze Star as an artillery captain in Vietnam.

Richard opened his own office in Fairmont before being elected to the House of Delegates in 1970. After serving one term as a Delegate, he was elected to the Supreme Court in 1972 at age 31. During his time on the Supreme Court, Richard became one of the most widely respected appellate judges in America and wrote seven books on courts, including How Courts Govern America.

Richard left the Court in 1995 to return to private practice; today he works as a partner at Neely & Callaghan. During his time in private practice, Richard litigated many high-profile cases. In addition to his private practice, Richard served as general counsel to the Charleston Gazette-Mail from 2013 to 2018 and currently serves as general counsel to WiLine Networks, Inc., a California wireless internet company with facilities throughout the United States.

Please list below 3 key messages of your campaign. What are the main points you want voters to remember about your goals for your time in office?

• The current Supreme Court is in a shambles. This Supreme Court has no experience running a court system and it shows.
• The backlog of cases has reached a critical point. West Virginians can't wait 19-28 months for the Supreme Court to hand down a decision that will affect their daily lives.
• Extreme delay in the system causes untold harm to women and children. For example, delay means that women who are awarded houses in a divorce can't get a home improvement loan because the case is still "in court," and children who come from hopeless families still can't be placed in "forever" homes.

What areas of public policy are you personally passionate about?

I am passionate about making the entire court system work efficiently so that litigants get correct decisions without unreasonable delay. That involves two things: (1) making the Supreme Court as quick as it was when I was last chief justice; and, (2) instituting elements of quality control so that local circuit courts are no longer black holes that receive motions that are never decided in a timely fashion.

Is there a book, essay, film, or something else you would recommend to someone who wants to understand your political philosophy?

With regard to my philosophy concerning courts and "judicial activism" including the need for deference to other branches of government, I offer my own book, How Courts Govern America, Yale University Press, 1980.

What characteristics or principles are most important for an elected official?

It is important for elected officials to recognize that government is not business, any more than a family is a business. President Franklin Roosevelt pointed out that in America we are as one great family where the welfare of every member is intertwined with the welfare of every other member. Ideally it is the responsibility of government to help compensate for natural injustice by extending a helping hand to those who were short-changed by fate: children born into abusive homes; women beaten and abused by their partners; workers thrown out of work by technological change; farmers and small business owners bankrupted by foreign competition; and, persons forced by economic circumstances to live and raise their families in dangerous slums dominated by predators.
Obviously there are other functions of government such as providing for public safety, providing good roads and infrastructure, and providing good public education, but while concentrating on these housekeeping functions of government it is necessary never to lose sight of the humane functions of government.

What qualities do you possess that you believe would make you a successful officeholder?

I spent 22 years as a WV Supreme Court justice and chief justice during which time I learned how to run a state court system. The WV court system is currently a shambles; it takes between 19 and 28 months for a case to get through the Supreme Court with no mechanism to separate serious appeals from frivolous ones. And, there are circuit judges who run their courts in such a way that they become black holes for litigation with simple motions lying undecided for over a year. I can fix the delay in the Supreme Court by returning to Art. 8, Section 4 of our State Constitution which provides for a two-step appeal process where the first step allows the early dismissal of frivolous appeals. The circuit court problem can be solved by the Supreme Court's adoption of reasonable quality control standards that require the expeditious dispatch of litigation business.

What is your favorite book? Why?

Alfred Lord Tennyson's Idylls of the King. Idylls of the King is one of the great treatises on the nature of politics ever written, although one must be a veteran of the political process fully to appreciate it.

Is there a particular judge, past or present, whom you admire?

U.S. Chief Justice John Marshall who used the law-making power of the courts to create a free trade zone throughout the American states and Chief Justice Earl Warren who spent his career furthering civil rights and individual freedom.

What is your primary concern about today's legal system in your state?

It currently takes between 19 and 28 months to get a case through the Supreme Court. When I last was chief justice in 1995, two out of five cases were disposed of within 60 days or sooner, and a case that had a full appeal with written decision took fewer than six months. The reason, then, for the current backup of cases, which is devastating to many litigants, is that the Supreme Court since 2010 has not followed Article 8, Section 4, of the West Virginia Constitution. That constitutional section is a housekeeping section that sets forth the exact procedure to be followed in processing appeals from circuit courts. In my opinion, the constitutional system worked very well from 1863 to 2010.

If you are not a sitting judge, do you have any previous judicial experience? Do you believe it’s important to have that kind of experience for this judgeship?

I spent 22 years on the Supreme Court, beginning when I was 31 years old, and I've written seven books about the structure, sociology and problems of courts. This kind of experience is critical in running an efficient court system

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