Political activist Gene Stilp filed a complaint with the state Judicial Conduct Board against state Supreme Court Chief Justice Ralph J. Cappy over his participation in the pay-jacking. As would an engineer, Mr. Cappy, it is said, carefully arranged all the members in state government so that this edifice to greed would have structural “integrity.” Thus, lawmakers voted to enrich themselves, judges, Gov. Rendell and his top executive officials. As for the foundation, the taxpayers soon would grow indifferent to the insult and accept the additional burden. The miscalculation soon became obvious. Cappy rose to publicly defend the pay grab, leaping into a political controversy from which the judiciary should stand apart. “I didn’t want to hide behind my robes,” he told Trib columnist Eric Heyl. “I felt a little guilty that (legislators) were being highly criticized, and I felt an obligation to explain the real facts.” Cappy’s hubris set the trap; he sprang it on himself. “These statements undermine the honor, integrity and independence of the judiciary … ,” Stilp said in his complaint. They do. And one more point: Cappy’s description — “prudent courage” — of the Legislature’s dead-of-night, no-debate lining of Harrisburg’s pockets is nothing less than odious. If this was “courage,” what superlative captures the character of our men and women at war?

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