Anonymous Help OK

A Judicial Ethics Advisory Committee opinion from Florida opines that a judge may make a financial contribution to defray the expenses of the campaign of a child for student government office at a state university. However, any such contribution must be made anonymously:

The Inquiring Judge states that the contribution would be used solelyto defray the costs of the student government candidate’s electioneffort; nevertheless, the potential exists for the candidate to solicitadditional contributions by impermissibly exploiting the InquiringJudge’s judicial position.  Therefore, before contributing financiallyto the student government candidate’s election effort, the InquiringJudge must take reasonable steps to ensure that the judge’s identitywill not be released.  Otherwise, the prestige of the judiciary couldbe injected into the student government candidate’s fundraisingactivity.

(Mike Frisch)