WSJ: Geroge Soros Bets on Nevada The Campaign to Hijack State Judicial Selection

WSJ: George Soros Bets on Nevada The Campaign to Hijack State Judicial Selection

By The Party Of No on October 22, 2010

For a lesson in courtroom politics, have a look at Nevada, where a first salvo in a nationwide campaign to end state judicial elections will greet voters on the November ballot. According to the measure, the state would switch to the so-called Missouri plan for choosing judges—putting the responsibility for courts in the hands of a legal elite, instead of with voters or elected representatives.

Used by more than 30 states, the Missouri plan lets a judicial nominating commission select a limited slate of judicial candidates (usually two or three) from whom the Governor may choose. Though created in the name of protecting judges from political influence, it hasn’t worked out that way. States using this so-called merit selection method have had their judicial selections manipulated by lawyers and bar associations that nominate guild favorites. In most cases this has pushed courts to the activist left.

That’s a nifty outcome for liberal groups who see the state courts as the next frontier for moving political agendas. The Nevada initiative is part of a nationwide effort supported by George Soros, among others, to eliminate judicial elections in state courts. Through groups such as Justice at Stake, Mr. Soros’s Open Society Institute has spent some $45 million on the cause nationwide, according to numbers tracked by the American Justice Partnership. Former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor has emerged as an unofficial spokesman for the effort, but the big money is coming from the political left. Nevada is viewed as a test drive.

One problem for this crowd is that Nevadans like their current way of selecting judges. According to a recent poll by Magellan Strategies, when voters were asked whether they prefer that judges be elected by voters or appointed by the Governor, 71.3% said they preferred elections. Only 9% said they believed the current elected state Supreme Court was doing a “poor” job, with the majority rating it as “good” or “fair.”

In 1972 and 1988 in Nevada, voters twice rejected proposed constitutional amendments that would have moved the state to a Missouri plan. Voters have done the same in Florida, Louisiana, South Dakota, Texas and Virginia. A greater percentage of state judges are now elected than when the Missouri plan was first conceived in 1906.

Meanwhile, the Missouri plan is coming under new criticism even in such Missouri-plan states as Kansas, Tennessee, Iowa, Alaska—and even Missouri. Iowa puts the retention of its commission-appointed state Supreme Court justices up for a vote, and this year as many as three could lose after controversial decisions supporting gay marriage. If any of them lose, it will mark the first time an Iowa Supreme Court Justice has lost an election since the system was adopted in 1962.

Judicial elections aren’t always pretty, but they do provide an important check on a branch of government that has itself become increasingly political. A system in which Governors can nominate anyone subject to legislative approval can also work, as it does for the federal courts.

But the worst system is to subcontract the third branch of government to a judicial elite who give elected officials little leeway. While parading as “merit” selections, these judges are political choices as much as any elected by voters. Nevada voters should send a message that their judiciary can’t be bought.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703859204575526164036476490.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_AboveLEFTTop

WSJ: George Soros Bets on Nevada The Campaign to Hijack State Judicial Selection

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