judgesonmerit.org

The editorial board at the San Antonio Express-News is calling for a change in Texas’s judicial selection. Texas currently uses partisan elections to select judges, but the editorial board believes that politics and money play too large a role in the process. In addition to worrying about politicizing the judiciary, the editorial condemns the fact that: “judges also are forced to solicit campaign contributions, and the only people who care enough to contribute to a judicial race most likely have or will have business before the court.” It notes former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor’s position against judicial elections as well as the fact that many judges acknowledge the public’s “discomfort” with the money involved in the system.

The editorial goes on to encourage the Texas legislature to adopt merit selection. We agree that the combined appointive and elective elements of merit selection provide the best means of ensuring fair and impartial courts. The public deserves a judiciary it can be confident in, not one tied up in politics and money. Judges have a unique position, and should be insulated from the campaigning and fundraising that accompany elections.

In the wake of Caperton, an editorial in the San Antonio Express-News urges Texas to adopt Merit Selection for its judges.  Leading the charge for reform in Texas is the current Chief Justice of the Texas Supreme Court, Wallace Jefferson.  His support for Merit Selection continues a tradition begun by his predecessors on the bench; he is “the third successive Texas Supreme Court chief justice to advocate reforming the state’s judicial selection process.”

Jefferson had warned of the danger posed by money-packed judicial elections even before the Caperton decision came down, telling the state legislature earlier this year: “If the public believes that judges are biased toward contributors, then confidence in the courts will suffer.”  The Express-News‘ editorial board concurs:

The judiciary system depends on an even playing field to maintain fairness.  And the influence of money and partisanship must be reduced to deliver the even playing field that Texans deserve.

That’s something everyone deserves — including Pennsylvanians.  The way to achieve that even playing field is by getting judges out of the fundraising business. The way to do that is to adopt Merit Selection.

An opinon piece in the San Antonio Express-News argues that electing judges just doesn’t make sense.  Bruce Davidson writes:

Good judges hate to raise money and act like politicians.

But the Texas judicial selection system forces them to be politicians, and that creates a major perception problem about Texas justice.

Texas, like Pennsylvania, elects all judges in partisan election contests. We’ve written recently about a new study finding that the majority of campaign contributions in the current campaign come from parties and lawyers who have recently litigated in the state Supreme Court.

The real problems with this system are the partisan election of judges who are supposed to be independent umpires and the flow of contributions that also undermines the perception of unbiased fairness.

Davidson also writes of the lack of information about the candidates available for voters seeking to make informed decisions.  His preferred solution is Merit Selection with retention elections: “Texans could dump bad judges, partisan sweeps would be eliminated and special-interest influence would be reduced.”

We agree that Merit Selection solves the problems inherent in using expensive partisan elections to select judges.  We wish them luck in Texas and hope Pennsylvanians will get to weigh in on whether we should change how we pick our appellate court judges.