judgesonmerit.org

There’s been a lot of chatter about a recent editorial in the Wall Street Journal criticizing those calling for Merit Selection of state judges. The editorial opened with a discussion of John Grisham’s new novel The Appeal, a story about a big corporation trying to influence the outcome of a case by contributing to a judicial election campaign. In response to Grisham’s comments that the novel was being played out in real life examples throughout the country, the editorial moved on to attack Merit Selection.

The editorial asserted: “In a result that might surprise Mr. Grisham, a 2007 Harvard study actually found that judges who are elected directly by voters are overall less corrupt than those who win their robes through other methods of selection.” This is a blatant mischaracterization of both the focus and the conclusions of the 2007 Harvard study.

The study, conducted by James Alt and David Lassen, focused on government corruption. It addressed whether the way judges are picked affects the ability of the judiciary to thwart corruption by the other branches of government. The study did not address judicial corruption, and it certainly didn’t reach conclusions about whether the way judges are selected affects levels of corruption in the judiciary.

The author of the editorial twisted the results of the study to serve her purpose of attacking those who support Merit Selection. In doing so, she misled the readers of the Wall Street Journal.

The facts about the Harvard study were presented to the Wall Street Journal in a letter to the editor authored by Lynn Marks of PMC and PMCAction and Seth Andersen of the American Judicature Society. However, this letter has not (at least as yet) been printed by the Journal.

Reasonable people can and do disagree about how judges should be selected. But reasonable people should make their decisions based on the facts. We trust the people of Pennsylvania to do just that and to vote on whether to change the way we select our appellate judges. What are the critics of Merit Selection so afraid of?

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