Lamh Foistenach Abu!
Posted on 12/23/2009 5:45:14 PM PST by reaganaut1
A group of judges, political officials and lawyers, led by the retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, has begun a campaign to persuade states to choose judges on the basis of merit, rather than their ability to win an election.
As a state legislator in the 1970s, Justice O’Connor helped Arizona create a merit selection system for judges. She is now chairwoman of the O’Connor Judicial Selection Initiative, announced this month by the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System at the University of Denver, to help make judges more than “politicians in robes,” as she has put it.
The group plans a new push to fight judicial corruption, and the perception of corruption that campaign money can cause, by encouraging state initiatives to scrap direct judicial elections. The work will include traveling from state to state, by invitation, to work with lawmakers, policy makers and advocates to build support for selection systems through public education, legislative counsel and political campaigns.
Rebecca Love Kourlis, the founder of the institute, acknowledged that getting voters to give up the right of direct election was “a hard sell,” but she argued, “You’re going to get a better caliber of judge over all.”
Merit systems — like the one that appointed Justice Kourlis to Colorado’s Supreme Court, where she served from 1995 to 2006 — generally involve a selection commission and regular “retention” elections in which voters can decide whether to keep their judges in power. Many states also have separate panels that report on judicial performance so that voters can go to the polls armed with information.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Soros and other leftists don't like judicial elections, preferring instead that lawyers select them.
Soros, related groups really want judicial control
"Soros-funded groups still cling to the notion that judicial independence and integrity can only be assured by handing the selection of judges over to lawyer-based groups and committees. Democracy and elections are best left to the executive and legislative branches of government, they say.
Trust that lawyers will determine the best people to arbitrate over every minute detail of society that is now ultimately decided in court, they say. This is the way to establish judicial independence, they say.
And, if you feel differently from these groups, be ready to be labeled as an "attack on the judiciary." Free speech is great for Soros' groups, but not for anyone else.
These groups would never admit the need for legal reform, nor would they acknowledge that some judges are better than others. They would never acknowledge an even more dramatic thought that some judges might not be living up the high standards they've been trusted to uphold and maintain.
It's hypocrisy at its worst."
Judges would be better selected via a Lottery type system.
Correction: Persuade states to choose judges on the basis of their committment to leftie dogma.
My first impression - bad idea.
SDO’C should have gone home when she retired. Instead, she took an office at the SC where (I think) she still hangs out in DC — meddling, meddling.
Keep electing judges.
Judge OConner...please exit stage left. Your “ideas” are mainly the rantings of an uninformed, leftist tool. Please go away. Please. You have done enough damage to the Republic.
Lamh Foistenach Abu!
And I’m all for doing away with appointing the Supreme Court justices and have them run in elections. Tenure is not a good thing!
Sandra Day O’Connor is a washed up old leftist Hag trying to somehow become relevant in her old age.
If their term is for life then the best, most sure way of expressing your dissatisfaction with their tyranny is to end that term.
;)
In Texas, my stepfather was pushed into becoming a county judge by the local community because during the years of his retirement they had come to value his judgement and fairness in county affairs as he kept being called upon to handle tax issues and construction with the new power plant and such things.
They elected him county judge and he had never worked in law, and he did not have a college degree, he did a great job, and kept their respect and loyalty.
One problem with law in America, is that we came to think that the lawyers are the experts and that the law belongs to them. The law belongs to the people, the lawyers should remain as hirelings within OUR legal system, not us remain as victims of THEIR legal system.
I agree
There is a reason we elect them, so they don’t become law makers.
Back in the 19th Cetury, the western states decided to elect judges so they would be accountable to the people as a whole, not just to the notables. What O’Connor is proposing that all judges be chosen by panels of lawyers.
Judges would be better selected via a Lottery type system.<<
Yeah...From a pool of trustees at any county prison...
Minimum qualification member in good standing with the state bar. A single three or four year term.
Yup. Would work.
So the next battle is trust the lawyer and shoot the people vs trust the people and shoot the lawyers
All judges should be elected.
Hell, at least half of them should be impeached!
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