Currently, voters elect judges. But some people, such as former Supreme Court justice Sandra Day O'Connor, think we should take judges out of the political process.
Central to their argument is the idea that if judges have to raise money for campaigns, it could make them beholden to special interests.
Hogwash.
Moving to a merit selection system - having voters pull a lever to "retain" judges - would have them "run" against no one. This is akin to "opt out" decisions we all face.
For example, when a student registering for college has to "opt out"
or say no to a yearbook or student union membership, statistically they skip the question, ignore it, or are more apt to say "what the heck" and leave it alone. In other words, the entity seeking the fee has a better chance of getting it or retaining it than they have of losing it.
This judicial change also would be removing the voters' right to choose someone else. That's right: If voters do not retain the judges, a commission or panel would recommend a short list to the state senate, governor, council or mayor - depending on the level that seat in the judicial hierarchy commands. Judges would then become the political pawn of one person or a select few, which would not happen if they were elected by the community they serve.
This all smacks of long-term or lifelong appointments.
To combat this, some jurisdictions conduct evaluations of the judges. The problem there is the establishment does the evaluating, not the media or the voter.
Despite the fact that few judges ever have competition in the elections for these positions, it's not wise to take the decision away from the voter.
The better solution is to make judges subject to term limits, just like all other elected officials.
Posted: Sunday, May 23, 2010
Article comment by:
Informed Elector
By the "pro" side's same argument do we presume that all politicians who raise money are "beholden to special interest"? well, of course they are. We just have to catch them at the quid pro quo to throw them in jail. Presently the only resort for aggrieved parties to spotlight corrupt judges is by an existing "Commission on Judicial Conduct" which is another white wash experiment in futility. If you look at the record of complaints against judges you will find 99 percent of the complaints are "dismissed" which would lead one to assume that judges are 99 percent correct all the time and no one since Solomon has had it right at those percentages. Let's keep the voters involved at every step of the electoral process. Voting for retention of bad judges once every few years only gives judges a lifetime appointment which is reserved for federal judges. Judges are supposed to be above favoritism. If we catch them exercising favoritism then they should be impeached, disbarred and sent to the same jails they send other criminals.
