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Thursday, August 10, 2006

Courts - Term limits for Colorado judges?

The Wall Street Journal has an opinion piece in its freely available section today titled "'Ten Years and Out' The case for term limits for judges." It is written by John Andrews, who is chairman of the Limit the Judges campaign and former president of the Colorado Senate from 2003 to 2005. Some quotes:

DENVER--Americans' concern with a court system out of control has simmered for decades, never coming to a boil. The perennial frustration with judges rewriting the laws and the Constitution is like Mark Twain's comment on the weather--everybody talks about it but nobody does anything about it. That may be about to change in Colorado, if voters pass judicial term limits this fall.

Coloradans have long favored the principle that rotation in office can help curb the abuse of power. The state, along with Oklahoma, led the nation in 1990 by imposing term limits on the legislative and executive branches of state government; citizen initiatives later extended the limits to most local officials and to our congressional delegation--though the latter was struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Judicial term limits have not met a great deal of legislative success. * * * But this year, reformers have gathered petitions with about 108,000 signatures, and recently set up a November 2006 vote on "10 years and out" for justices of the Colorado Supreme Court and judges of the Court of Appeals. The ballot initiative will almost certainly be certified in the coming days. * * *

Up to 1965, Colorado was one of the many states that elected all their judges in partisan campaigns. We've since been on the so-called "Missouri merit" plan, where the governor appoints judges from a slate prepared by a nominating commission. Judges then face periodic retention elections, with "retain" or "do not retain" recommendations from a judicial performance commission. It sounds good, but fewer than 1% of all judges ever get dismissed by voters, leading to virtual life tenure with little accountability.

Our ballot issue, "Limit the Judges," would reduce the retention cycle to four years (after an appointee's first provisional term, which can be as short as two years), and cap total service at three terms, about 10 years or a bit longer depending on date of appointment. It applies only to Supreme Court justices, whose current retention cycle is 10 years, and Appeals Court judges, now on an eight-year cycle. District judges' terms are not affected.

This modest proposal has infuriated the bench and bar--aided and abetted, of course, by the media--who characterize it as radical, reckless, an assault on judicial independence and a dangerous politicizing of the courts. * * *

The judicial term limit plan has an additional provision, if the reform is approved this year, that would eject at the end of 2008 any incumbents on the two high courts who have already served 10 years or more. Limit the Judges, then, functions not only as a constitutional amendment but also a referendum on the performance of our robed policy makers.

Five of the seven state Supreme Court justices, all mostly liberal, would be gone in two years if the measure passes; likewise seven of 15 Appeals Court judges. The Colorado Bar Association bemoans a cumulative loss of 185 years' experience on the bench, but that argument may prove no more persuasive to voters in relation to the judicial branch than when it was previously deployed in vain for the legislative branch.

In my experience, term limits have helped make Colorado's legislature more respectful of the plain language of the constitution and more responsive to the sovereign will of the people. I believe term limits can yield similar benefits in our court system.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on August 10, 2006 09:02 AM
Posted to Courts in general