Creating a separate thread so as to not hijack the Wisconsin election thread itself:
The Washington Post ran a good op-ed about why electing judges is a bad idea.
Essentially, judges who are elected focus more on legal outcomes that have to do with popularity than with actual law or justice. And the process of electing them simply deepens the perception in people’s minds that the judiciary is a political, not neutral, body.
I totally agree. Although I don’t like them being appointed by politicians either. Ideally they should rise to become eligible for serving on lower benches and being highly ranked by their peers and not having their decisions reversed, then picked from a hat or something.
Democracy is the worst system of government, except for all of the other ones.
You can have a democracy without every government official being elected.
There could also be a mechanism where the popular vote puts someone on a list to be eligible in 5 years’ time or something Or that they have to get ranked three times in a row to become eligible. What I think we want is that the passions of today don’t make or break a jurist’s opportunity to be on the high bench. It should be their longstanding reputation, established over time and perceived over time.
Judges have long made decisions based on personal opinions and preferences rather than strictly following the law*, so while electing judges does potentially exacerbate bias, it doesn’t create it.
There should at least in some situations be a mechanism for voters to recall judges who make particularly asinine and damaging decisions.
*regardless of the quaint conceit on the right that their judges only want to uphold the Constitution.
In my home state of Washington, judges are elected but run as non-partisan. And in truth, I can’t tell if a judge is “liberal” or “conservative” or anywhere between from my voters’ pamphlet. They list their qualifications and some of their philosophies but it’s not like they say “I believe abortion is murder” or “all undocumented immigrants are people and deserve rights” or anything. Might that be a compromise to assuage the fear of judges being too political?
The Wisconsin race is TECHNICALLY non-partisan, but this year it was just SUPER obvious which party which candidate would fit in. IIRC it used be more subtle but even then one could figure it out.
Brian
In my experience as a Washingtonian, non-partisan races are a joke. Here in Thurston County last year, we had two candidates for sheriff who were both identified on the ballot as non-partisan. The challenger was a former social worker before becoming a deputy and ran on a platform of reforming the department and improving relations with the community, who since being elected has introduced new standards for when deputies can chase suspects and has had thin blue line and Punisher decals removed from the department’s cars. The incumbent openly campaigned with the county Republicans, was outspoken about his refusal to enforce the mask mandate in 2020, and was involved in multiple drunk driving accidents, all of which were “impartially” investigated by the Lewis County sheriff, who just coincidentally happened to be his twin brother, and who completely refused to participate in transition of power after he lost the election and locked the sheriff-elect out of public meetings until the day he left office.
It’s no wonder that the only Republican elected to statewide office in recent years has since resigned to work for the Biden administration, because the state Republicans refuse to nominate anyone anymore who isn’t a MAGA cultist who can’t possibly win over the Puget Sound residents who comprise the majority of the state’s voting body.
And therein lies the problem. The judiciary (apart from possibly the very top) should NOT be part of the government.
Alaska has a commission (non-partisan?) that nominates three candidates the Governor must choose from for any judicial vacancy. It’s not perfect, but it does remove the unqualified. Judges have to run in “retention” campaigns, with no opponent. I can’t recall a judge not being retained, but it does give the voters some power if a judge goes off the deep end. (i.e., Justice Thomas type situation)
You want independent contractors running the courts? 
So one of the three branches of the government shouldn’t be part of the government?
Judges administer the laws that government makes. Their job is interpreting it, weighing evidence, and making decisions.
Why that would make them “independent contractors” I have no idea. They should be promoted from a pool of experienced and highly qualified council.
The appointment of judges is a problem.
In some forgotten volume of forgotten lore I read of one system that was used in the US.
The judges have a term of (let’s say) five years. At the end of the five years, the people are asked “Shall Judge Jones remain in office?”
When there is a vacancy on the bench, the lower house selects three candidates. The upper house throws out one, leaving two. The governor throws out one and appoints the other one. (Looking at it, it might be best to do that in reverse order. The Governor names, three. The Senate tosses out one. The lower house selects one of those two.)
But that leaves us the problem of the political people simply refusing to name anyone to the bench at all.
At one time the New York Supreme Court judges had a 25-year term of office. A court with 25 judges all serving staggered 25-year terms might work. But of course how to select them is another issue.
It is a tough, but important, issue.
I see no mention of three branches of government in the Constitution.
Are you being obtuse, or are you just saying that the word “branch” is not used.
That doesn’t mean that there aren’t three branches of government, one of which is the judicial one.
Also, the U.S. government seems to think it’s constitutionally mandated:
The Constitution of the United States divides the federal government into three branches: legislative, executive, and judicial.
No. I am pointing out that the courts being the equal of the political branches is an innovation from Marbury v. Madison in 1803. The Founding Fathers did not intend the courts to function as they do.
That is not to say that our system is bad. It is to say that it is an example of our unwritten Constitution.
The concept pre-dates the Marbury decision
The concept of judicial review was already established at the time of the Founding. The Privy Council had employed a limited form of judicial review to review colonial legislation and its validity under the colonial charters.1 There were several instances known to the Framers of state court invalidation of state legislation as inconsistent with state constitutions.2 Practically all of the Framers who expressed an opinion on the issue in the Convention appear to have assumed and welcomed the existence of court review of the constitutionality of legislation.3 Alexander Hamilton argued in favor of the doctrine in the Federalist Papers .4 In enacting the Judiciary Act of 1789, Congress explicitly provided for the exercise of the power,5 and in other legislative debates questions of constitutionality and of judicial review were prominent.6 Early Supreme Court Justices seem to have assumed the existence of judicial review.7
https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artIII-S1-2/ALDE_00013513/