Java/Swing GUI code/layout, am I doing this wrong?
Your code seems perfectly fine!

However...

If all of this code is in the same block (e.g., a constructor or a layout builder method), I would recommend that you break up the layout code into smaller functions. That will improve readability and code structure a bit.

Also, you should definately familiarize yourself with some GUI builders for Java (in my case it was WindowBuilder for Eclipse). Writing layout code by hand can be a pain and a source of bugs that you won't be able to resolve easily.