NCSC selects eight for induction into Warren E. Burger Society

Induction recognizes support of national court organization

Williamsburg, Va. (Nov. 15, 2010) — The National Center for State Courts will induct eight people into the Warren E. Burger Society during its Annual Recognition Luncheon on Friday, Nov. 19. The luncheon, which will be held at the Mandarin Oriental hotel in Washington, D.C., will be hosted by Texas Chief Justice Wallace B. Jefferson, chair of NCSC’s Board of Directors. 

The Warren E. Burger Society honors individuals who have volunteered their time, talent, and support to the National Center in exceptional ways. It is named for the former chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court who helped found the NCSC in 1971. 

This year’s Burger Society inductees include two state chief justices, two court administrators, an attorney, and three nationally known experts on a variety of court issues. All of the inductees have demonstrated an exemplary commitment to improving the administration of justice through their service to and support of the National Center. 

The 2010 inductees are:

• John T. Broderick Jr., chief justice of the New Hampshire Supreme Court
• Ronald M. George, chief justice of the Supreme Court of California
• James D. Gingerich, director of the Arkansas Administrative Office of the Courts
• Janice T. Munsterman, former executive director of the State Justice Institute
• Dudley Oldham, retired senior partner and current of counsel for Fulbright & Jaworski L.L.P.
• Sally Rider, director of the William H. Rehnquist Center on the Constitutional Structures of Government
• Roger K. Warren, chair of the Board of Directors of the Justice at Stake Campaign
• Robert A. Zastany, executive director of the Administrative Office of the Nineteenth Judicial Circuit of Lake County, Ill.

Burger Society inductees are selected by a committee chaired by Texas attorney Charles M. Noteboom, who commissioned a portrait of Chief Justice Burger that hangs in the National Center’s headquarters in Williamsburg, Va. Each inductee receives a limited edition of that portrait, which is signed and numbered by the artist, Fran Di Giacomo. There are 1,986 prints of the portrait, the first two of which are owned by Chief Justice Burger’s children and the last of which was owned by the late U.S. Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, who took his oath from the retiring Chief Justice Burger in 1986. 

The National Center for State Courts, headquartered in Williamsburg, Va., is a nonprofit court reform organization dedicated to improving the administration of justice by providing leadership and service to the state courts. Founded in 1971 by the Conference of Chief Justices and Chief Justice of the United States Warren E. Burger, NCSC provides education, training, technology, management, and research services to the nation’s state courts.