District Judge Brent Adams speaks Friday during the debate. Photos by John Gurzinski. Attorney James Bopp Jr. speaks Friday during The Federalist Society Las Vegas Chapter luncheon debate on Judicial Free Speech and Campaign Finance Regulation at the Golden Nugget.

A fiery Washoe County judge faced off against an eloquent Indiana attorney while an audience of Nevada judges and lawyers munched on sandwiches and chips Friday at the Golden Nugget.

A judge's right to free speech was the topic of the two-man lunchtime debate. It delved into the notion that a candidate who solicits judicial campaign contributions from lawyers -- who may appear in court before the candidate -- is exercising a form of free speech that doesn't affect a judge's impartiality.

The debate featured Judge Brent Adams versus attorney James Bopp Jr., who in 2002 won a landmark case before the U.S. Supreme Court. He argued that Minnesota was violating the First Amendment rights of judicial candidates. A state code of judicial conduct had prevented them from discussing their stands on legal issues during campaigns.

Having a viewpoint on legal issues should be a job qualification for judges, Bopp told the luncheon crowd at the first debate sponsored by the newly active local chapter of The Federalist Society.

"You'd have to be a frigging moron" not to have thoughts about legal principles and issues already, Bopp said. And voters should be allowed to hear candidates express those views before an election.

"I have this," said Adams, dangling a dollar bill from the podium, "for the person who believes the purpose of the First Amendment is to raise campaign cash."

According to Adams, an 18-year veteran of the state bench, a judge's hardest task is not finding a fair sentence for a wrongdoer. "The most difficult thing in the world is facing a contributor in the courtroom, who has given thousands to your campaign -- because you asked him -- and ruling against him."

The Nevada Supreme Court in December unanimously rejected a proposal by Adams requiring judge candidates to use a committee to ask for campaign contributions, instead of personally soliciting money.

The Federalist Society is a national organization that promotes legal debate. Matthew Saltzman, local chapter president, described it as group founded several decades ago by conservatives, "law students who were unhappy with what they considered to be the liberal dominance in the court and law schools." U.S. District Judge Robert Clive Jones moderated the event.

Both Friday speakers are heavyweights in the subject of judicial and legal ethics.

Bopp made his first national mark litigating cases for the right-to-life movement in the 1980s. "I am an advocate representing organizations all over the United States, on the conservative, Republican, pro-life, pro-family side," he said in his introduction.

He is currently involved in 10 cases where his clients are challenging aspects of the conduct code that govern judicial candidates, such as, a candidate's right to say which political party he belongs to, attend fund-raisers, endorse candidates in other races and personally solicit campaign donations.

A member of the Republican National Committee, Bopp said he also was recently named special advisor to the 2008 presidential campaign of Republican Mitt Romney, former Massachusetts governor.

For his part, Adams has tried several times since the early 1990s to stop personal campaign solicitations by Nevada judges, to remove what he considers to be a suspicion of favoritism in court by a judge toward attorneys or litigants who have given donations.

In 1993, Adams was one of two Washoe County judges who filed complaints with the state's Judicial Discipline Commission alleging that a third judge, Jerry Whitehead, had violated the code of conduct that forbids improper contacts with lawyers. In a several-year saga, Whitehead and the state supreme court struggled with the commission procedurally. In 1996, Whitehead stepped down from the bench as part of a deal with the U.S. Justice Department to avoid federal prosecution on charges that were never disclosed.

Judges have First Amendment rights, despite an American legal history that has treated candidates in judicial races differently than candidates for executive or legislative office, according to Bopp.

"The problem is judicial activism," Bopp argued during the Las Vegas debate. "That's the threat to judicial independence," not judges who speak their minds or ask for funds. As improper activism, he cited the U.S. Supreme Court 2005 decision in the Kelo case. The high court upheld a Connecticut city's seizure of private land in by eminent domain, which it then turned over to another private party for redevelopment.

Bopp would set some limits on judicial speech. He favors setting a reasonable ceiling per campaign contribution. The problem of unduly influencing candidates comes from receiving large donations, not many small ones.

"Today in Nevada, there's one qualification to be judge" -- money, Adams asserted -- "$500,000 for a district court judgeship or $1 million to be on the state Supreme Court." The relentless search for money to feed the machine that propels a candidate to victory results in negative but shallow media sound bites, the judge claimed

Adams admitted his proposal for candidates exclusively to use committees to raise funds doesn't remove the risk of corruption. After the debate, he said he supports requiring Nevada judges to disclose in the court record if he or she has received campaign contributions from the lawyers and clients appearing in that courtroom.

In April, The Federalist Society will have a debate on whether Nevada judges should be appointed by selection committees instead of elected by voters.