Charles Grisbaum Jr.

Charles H. Grisbaum Jr. (born December 31, 1936) is the retired chief judge of the Louisiana Fifth Circuit Court of Appeal, based in Gretna in Jefferson Parish in the New Orleans suburbs. Grisbaum's last term expired on December 31, 2002.

The court was created by Act 3 of the 1981 regular legislative session, and the enabling legislation was signed by Republican Governor David C. Treen. The Fifth Circuit is composed of these four parishes: Jefferson, St. Charles, St. James, and St. John the Baptist.

Prior to the judgeship, Grisbaum represented suburban District 79 in Jefferson Parish in the Louisiana House of Representatives from 1972 to 1982. He was a Democrat until 1977, when he switched his affiliation to Republican. Then he was elected in 1979 to a full term as a Republican, but he left midway in that last term to assume the judgeship.^[1]

In 1974, Grisbaum was the Democratic nominee for Louisiana's 3rd congressional district. He lost to the Republican incumbent, David Treen, the first GOP congressman from Louisiana since Reconstruction. Few issues surfaced in the congressional race. Grisbaum accused Treen of having a zero rating from the trade association known as the National Council of Senior Citizens. Treen replied that a rival group, the Committee of Fairness to the Aging, had given him a 100 percent rating. The exchange reflected that there was always some interest group in the nation's capital that would grade lawmakers as they wish to be depicted. Questions about Treen's commitment to the problems of the elderly, however, would emerge again in the 1979 gubernatorial election against the Democratic candidate, Louis Lambert of Baton Rouge.

Treen won a second term in Congress in 1974, with 55,572 votes (58.5) to Grisbaum's 39,412 (41.5 percent). Treen won his own Jefferson Parish with 64.2 percent and did nearly as well, with 62.8 percent, in sugar-growing Iberia Parish. Treen won Terrebonne Parish (Houma) fairly handily but only narrowly prevailed in Lafourche and St. Mary parishes. He lost St. Charles Parish with 46.6 percent and the two St. Martin Parish precincts then in the Third District. After he defeated Grisbaum, Treen did not again face serious opposition for his House seat in the 1976 and 1978 elections.

Grisbaum switched parties and ran as a Republican in the 1979 nonpartisan blanket primary. When asked why he had changed affiliation, Grisbaum said that he was "a practical politician. The first commandment of politics is to serve your constituency, and to do that, you have to get reelected." He was referring to the growing Republicanism taking root in the New Orleans suburbs.

Grisbaum said that he developed a close friendship with Treen as a result of their congressional race. By 1980, Grisbaum was a floor leader for Governor Treen in the legislature. When Grisbaum resigned the seat in 1982, he was succeeded by another Democrat-turned-Republican, James J. "Jim" Donelon, a former Jefferson Parish president and later the state insurance commissioner.

Judge Grisbaum lives in Metairie with his wife, Beverly M. Grisbaum (born 1941). The couple has four children.

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