The Judicial Selection Commission has amended its rules and will now release the names of judicial candidates it sends to the governor for appointment, the panel announced Wednesday.

The commission said its own rules that had restricted the release of the names were broader than the confidentiality requirement in the state constitution.

Under its revised rules, the commission will make public the names of the nominees when it submits them to the governor, the panel said.

"We applaud the rule change," said Diane Hastert, a lawyer for the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, which filed a lawsuit over Gov. Neil Abercrombie’s refusal to release the commission’s candidates when he made three judicial appointments this year.

"It appears it will ensure the public’s right to know the names of state judicial candidates going forward, which is exactly our client’s goal," Hastert said.

She said the lawsuit over the governor’s past refusal is still pending, noting that Circuit Judge Karl Sakamoto ruled on Monday that Abercrombie must release the lists for the three appointments.

Hastert said the newspaper’s lawyers will seek attorney fees and costs from the state since it prevailed in the case.

She said the amount could be in the tens of thousands of dollars.

Abercrombie could not be reached for comment Wednesday night on the commission’s new rules, but earlier in the day, before the commission’s announcement, he said he wanted to see the judge’s written order before deciding whether to appeal the ruling.

"I’ll try to come to a conclusion as quickly as I can as to whether or not it applies to the point I’m trying to make, both philosophically and legally," he said.

The nine-member Judicial Selection Commission was created by a 1978 constitutional amendment in an effort to emphasize merit in the selection of judges.

The commission screens applicants and sends names of four to six candidates to the governor for appointment to the state Supreme, Appeals and Circuit courts.

The panel sends at least six names to the chief justice for District Court appointments.

The constitutional amendment mandated that the commission’s "deliberations" be kept confidential. In 1979, the commission adopted rules prohibiting disclosing its lists of candidates.

The commission apparently started reviewing the rule after Abercrombie disclosed in January that he would not release the names when he selected Sabrina McKenna for the Hawaii Supreme Court.

Previous governors Ben Cayetano and Linda Lingle had routinely made public the list of candidates from the commission.

"The commission’s review and research over the past six months have determined that (the restrictions) are broader than the state constitution requires, and the policies that may have been served by more restrictive rules when they were adopted decades ago have given way to new policies and priorities," the commission said.

The commission said the restrictions were lifted on Wednesday.

The revised rule now says the commission "shall release lists of its nominees for judicial office concurrent with its submission of each list to the appointing authority."

The commission said it also will be permitted to disclose "statistical and historical information that summarizes patterns and trends in judicial selection."

The panel said information involving applicants, the commission’s vote and communications among the commissioners will remain confidential.

The commission "believes that the judicial selection process will be strengthened by the new rules because the work product of the JSC will now be more easily accessible and more readily evaluated by the public," the panel said.

Honolulu attorney Susan Ichinose is chairwoman of the commission.

Other members are Frederick T. Okumura, George Masuoka, James Bickerton, Albert Y. Kanno, Lloyd Yonenaka, Annelle Amaral, Jeffrey Portnoy and Thomas Waters.

In refusing to release the lists, Abercrombie said lawyers would refrain from applying because they don’t want their names made public.

Sakamoto said state lawyers did not submit any evidence to substantiate that point.

State lawyers also cited the commission’s confidentiality rule — now lifted — to support Abercrombie’s position.

But Sakamoto said the commission’s rule does not justify Abercrombie’s refusal to disclose the lists in view of a 1993 Hawaii Supreme Court decision that said it is up to the governor or chief justice to release the names.