Tax Court:  Four months to the day after the Supreme Court issued its Ballard and Kanter opinions (blogged here), the Tax Court has proposed changing its rules to give taxpayers access to special trial judges’ reports:

• Press Release
• Notice of Proposed Amendments to Rules
• Press coverage of the proposed rule change:
  • Chicago Tribune
  • New York Times

Chicago Tribune:  The newspaper reports that the judge in the case, Howard Dawson, was the reviewing judge in 80% of the cases involving trial judge findings since 1991:

Since 1991, a total of 640 rulings involving trial judges have been issued, and Dawson was the reviewing judge in 512 of them, according to the analysis. In each case Dawson said he agreed with the trial judge’s findings.

Leandra Lederman, the William W. Oliver professor of tax law at Indiana University School of Law in Bloomington, said, "I think that transparency in judicial process is extremely important. Secrecy and the appearance of secrecy are to be avoided. "You not only want actual fairness but the appearance of fairness, and there is nothing like secrecy to undermine the appearance of fairness," Lederman said. She said she also is disturbed by "the number of instances and the high fraction in which Judge Dawson was the reviewing judge–those two facts together could increase the extent to which people become distrustful of the process, even if it’s the only time it ever happened."

The Tribune has requested access to all special trial judges’ reports, and Tax Court Chief Judge reports that the Tribune’s request is  "under active consideration and a reply will soon be forthcoming."