(Todd “Taxpayer” Bailey) – Vote NO on SJR2, and retain your right to elect judges in the State of Nevada. Consider what happened in 2003, when the Supreme Court ruled against the people on the two-thirds requirement to raise taxes, that’s how important this is. One year later, right before an election, the Supreme Court reversed itself, and reaffirmed the two-thirds requirement to raise taxes, the NOW accepted law of the land. That would NEVER happen if SJR2 passes.
The foundation of the call to pass SJR2 are problems with the Judicial Commission in Nevada, a Constitutional body. There have been changes clearly identified, changes that may need to be made. So why are they not included in SJR2? Shouldn’t those changes come first? The problem is what to do with judges that go bad, right? So how does SJR2 solve this? It does not.
Many people have identified problems with the Judicial Discipline Commission, yet SJR2 creates two NEW commissions that are similar in structure of membership and answering to the same people. There is the NEW Judicial Selection Commission and the NEW Judicial Performance Commission. Neither of these would answer to the taxpaying voters.
How do these two NEW commissions help with Judicial Discipline? They don’t.
It’s interesting that the same people who created the problem of a less than satisfactory Judicial Commission, are now offering SJR2 as the solution. Why should we trust the people who created the current problem in the 70′s, with a new solution in 2010? Most Nevada taxpayers do not, they trust themselves to elect judges.
SJR2 did not get a unanimous, or even a two-thirds vote in the legislature. Sec 20 of SJR2 interferes with the Governor’s office too much. If the commissions are appointed by one governor, and another governor comes in after the appointments that he does not like, that could be a real constitutional crisis, forcing the governor to appoint someone he “thinks” is a bad choice. Remember 2003.
There are even studies in states that have adopted the “appointment” based system that SJR2 would create showing that “judges picked by so-called nonpartisan selection commissions overwhelmingly leaned Democrat. Since 1995 in Tennessee, 67% of appellate nominees more often voted in Democratic primaries, compared to 33% who voted more often in Republican primaries. Similar research in Missouri found that of roughly half of appellate nominees who made campaign contributions, some 88% donated to Democrats while only 12% went to Republicans.”
Source WSJ, “Missouri Brakes:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124000908903430593.html
Stated another way, SJR2 would create a more liberal, over reaching, activist judiciary.
SJR2 sounds great, “if lawyers and the people want to get rid of a judge, they can in less than 18 months”. The problem is you force the lawyers and the people to be AGAINST a judge. That’s a really bad thing to be, few people challenge incumbent judicial candidates in this way.
Under the current system, you can be FOR someone else, without being AGAINST anyone, a safer place. Most people understand the difference, and so again SJR2 does not solve the problem, and may make it worse.
Most Nevadans do not support SJR2, it’s just not the solution.
In November 2010, Vote NO on SJR2, and retain your right to elect judges in the State of Nevada. If elected to the Nevada Senate, I will always vote NO on the appointment of judges, regardless of who the sponsor is.
You can read the legislative history of SJR2 here:
http://leg.state.nv.us/75th2009/Reports/history.cfm?ID=241
AND download a copy of SJR2 here:
http://leg.state.nv.us/75th2009/Bills/SJR/SJR2_74_EN.pdf
I want to urge all candidates for the Nevada Legislature to Vote NO on SJR2 on election day, and speak out against it to their voters. Help retain the right to elect judges by the people in the State of Nevada.
(Mr. Bailey is a Republican candidate for the Nevada state senate in Washoe County)
Sorry folks, got news for you. Electing judges in a non-partisan election isn’t any better or worse than an appointment system. I got one name for you to prove it — Elizabeth Halvorsen. A Republican who was ELECTED judge in Clark County, later removed by the judicial discipline commission AND defeated in an election. The point? Electing judges produced bad judges, just like appointing judges produces bad judges. (Yes, we do appoint judges in Nevada where there is a vacancy during a term, so we have experience in this area as well. I would also remind the author of this article that every single one of the supreme court justices who voted to override the 2/3 vote issue was ELECTED!) There are other reasons why electing judges in a nonpartisan election is a bad idea.
Electing judges in a “nonpartisan” election is a very bad idea because the VAST majority of people who vote in judicial elections pull the lever for the guy or gal whose name they recognize, regardless of their qualifications . It is RARE that anyone knows anything about the candidate they are voting for. The winner is usally the woman with the most name recognition, which means it is the person who has the most money to be able to put up large signs and billboards. If you doubt it I can give you dozens of examples. Electing judges also infuses the added problem of having trial lawyers decide who becomes a judge. Why? Because in the end, lawyers who run for judge have to get campaign contributions from somewhere, and who do you think wants to buy influence? Trial lawyers! Hence, you get judges who are bought and paid for by trial lawyers. Not a good system. You only THINK you have the ability to vote them out, but in reality, trying to beat an incumbent judge is virtually impossible once they are elected to office. Why? Because the trial lawyers will always have more money to ensure their re-election than you will have money to defeat them. If you doubt that, once again, find out how many incumbent judges have been defeated by opponents in a Nevada judicial election? You are more likely to get hit by lightning than to have the scoundrels defeated in an election by a challenger.
Electing judges in a PARTISAN election is a far better idea. It’s not perfect, but it is better. Atleast if you identify the candidates party affiliation, you can have a little bit of faith that said candidate aligns themselves with some philosophical/political benchmark by which the voter can identify or oppose. It doesn’t educate the voters on the candidate’s background but it helps. Having judges run as “Nonpartisan” in elections doesn’t change the philosophical/political beliefs of the candidate, all it does is hide information from the voter by making the voter believe, erroneously, that the candidate doesn’t have any opinions that matter. It doesn’t create a perfect system (Elizabeth Halvorsen was a Republican) but it is much better than the “nonpartisan” system we have now.
Todd Taxpayer’s comments on the subject are sophomoric and don’t dig deep enough. Anyone can repeat statements posted in a newspaper article, but where’s the real analysis? What he doesn’t answer, but should have, is WHY the appointment of judges through the “Missouri” system has produced such skewed results. Dig a little deeper below the surface and you discover that the REAL problem with the system is the composure of the selection commission body itself. That problem is TRIAL LAWYERS occupying the majority of the seats on the selection commission!!! Trial lawyers are ALWAYS left leaning and hence they tend to select large-PI Settlement-oriented judicial candidates just like themselves, i.e., liberal PI attorneys. If you doubt it, dig a little deeper into the backgrounds of the judges that are appointed in those states that have the Missouri Plan and you will see that this is true. Take away the trial lawyers on the committees, add in an equal number of non-lawyer-regular-Joe’s, and you have solved the problem with appointment of judges. The people have their say, the people get qualified judges. Simple.
I’m not advocating for an appointment system, because it along with the election system sucks out loud. I just think we need to identify the real problems and make informed choices.
Your comments have a lot of merit Anaconda, and I support MOST of what you are suggesting. In many ways, you are supporting my position, as I agree and cited problems with the current system. SJR2 would be much worse, as you indicated.
Todd Taxpayer Bailey is absolutely right!! We, the people, have lost enough of our rights as it is without losing our right to vote. We need to select our own judges not allow 1 person to select them. I don’t want the likes of, say a Rory Reid, selecting my judges, thank you. I would much rather elect them myself!!
[...] Nevada News & Views: Keep Your Right to Elect Your Judges Todd Bailey – 4/14/2010 [...]
Well I hate to break it to you but there are many benefits to the appointment process. Oh by the way as for its exsistence, there is a judicial selection committee already in place. I am not an attorney nor am I a judge. I gave Todd the Taxpayer the option to discuss this matter but he never made an appointment. No wonder he lost his run. I can tell you if you looked up the selection process you not only have a vote, you have 3. I partisipated in the Judicial selection process as a private citizen and was able to speak and write about some of the canidates for a judicial position. The sad thing about a vote is that if you get a bad judge, he or she is there for 4 to 6 years. As for the selection process you can vote them out in 2 years. I am sure there are quite a few people who wish they could take back their vote in a few other races. By the way the attorneys have to prove that they are qualified then they are put in front of the selection committee which are made up of private citizens and attorneys. They are published in the paper and private citizens can go and speak in person. In my particular case the attorney was not even selected. SJR2 does not address the Judicial disapline because that year AJR1 addressed this issue the 3 strikes rule which Todd did not attend. Thank god he was not elected because he is not up to date. I have a page on twitter if you have any questions about SJR2 and really want to be informed feel free to tweet. I am a republican and I support SJR2 in my oppinion the only people who wouldn’t want this would be corrupt Judges, because they would have to answer to the people, or they would be out in the retention vote that would be vote 3.
Minnesota still elects Judges, “but for” appointments 4 only the Franchise of Licensed Lawyers contrary to Separation of Powers: Sharon Anderson is not a Liar or Lawyer http://www.sharon4judge.blogspot.com
Thanks