A dilemma regarding bar association evaluations

You'll notice Judge Shapiro's 'in his own words' post begins with a quote from his CBA evaluation.

The judicial evaluation committees of the various bar associations are working long hours to sift through the candidates' applications and complete their evaluations of the candidates' credentials. When all the evaluations are done, the bar associations will post their findings (this link, for example, will take you to the CBA results when they are available).

In the meantime, however, bar associations are releasing results on a candidate by candidate basis -- but only to the candidates themselves. Some, but not all, of the candidates have their evaluations from some, but not all, of the bar associations which are doing evaluations.

I will be posting the complete results from the different evaluating groups when they are released... but, in the meantime, I have something of a dilemma.

James E. Babcock, Jr. sent out an email this morning advising that he's received "Qualified" ratings from the Chicago Bar Association and the Illinois State Bar Association, a "Recommended" rating from the Lesbian and Gay Bar Association of Chicago, and a "Highly Recommended" rating from the Decalogue Society. (Babcock sent this email to me and several newspaper reporters.)

I'm torn about posting this information -- and this has nothing to do with Mr. Babcock personally: I just don't know how fair it is to disclose information like this about Candidate A in a race before Candidate B gets his or her results. The bar associations do not infer or imply that Candidate A is more qualified or more highly recommended than Candidate B, if both are found "Qualified" or "Recommended," just because Candidate A's ratings are finished first. On the other hand, waiting until everyone's ratings are completed to reveal anyone's ratings will take us close to the February 5 primary date -- too close in time, perhaps, for the ratings to have the influence they might otherwise have on the voters.

Thus my dilemma: I want to help candidates publicize their favorable ratings, but I don't wish to contribute to any incorrect impression that a candidate who is evaluated sooner is somehow better than a candidate who receives the same ratings but not until a later date.

If you have an opinion on this subject, I would very much like to hear it. Leave a comment.