How are your judges selected?

[Zkribbler]

I just finished filling out my mail-in ballot. About 2/3 of it is judicial candidates, which IMHO is ridiculous. I knew two names. Other than those two, I had only two pieces of information for each candidate: name & occupation.

There must be a better way. How do your judges get selected?

Spoiler Psst, Timsup2nothin: :

Victoria Chavez, yes. Justice Gilbert, no.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

We don't elect ours. They're appointed.

 

[Zkribbler]

We don't elect ours. They're appointed.

By the governor? Does the legislature confirm?

 

[Valka D'Ur]

By the governor? Does the legislature confirm?

We don't have governors, so I'm not sure what you mean.

 

[Grisu]

Federal judges are elected by the united federal assembly (both chambers of parliament).

edit: apperntly cantonal judges are elected by the people in some cases, too.

 

[Zkribbler]

We don't have governors, so I'm not sure what you mean.

The head of the executive branch. In our states, this is the governor.
In the US, the federal govt has a court system, and each state has its own court system;
Trump, with the consent of the Senate, appoints federal judges.
In California, state judges are elected by the people of the county in which they serve. (I don't know what other states do.)

 

[Arwon]

Nobody really knows

 

[Arwon]

The head of the executive branch. In our states, this is the governor.
In the US, the federal govt has a court system, and each state has its own court system;
Trump, with the consent of the Senate, appoints federal judges.
In California, state judges are elected by the people of the county in which they serve. (I don't know what other states do.)

The executive function isn't really a separate "branch" from the legislative like that in Westminster systems. Executive government is carried out by members of the legislature.

 

[Arwon]

Here we go, here's how the Australian government makes judicial appointments. I assume the states are each similar.

 

[Silurian]

In the UK Judges are appointed by Merit rather than public opinion.
The Judicial Appointments Commission in England and Wales.

https://www.judicialappointments.gov.uk/
https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/judicial-appointments-commission

 

[Snerk]

Not an expert on the matter but our judges are selected by an independent council. The members of this organ can only sit a limited term and they are hired from groups of different background within law to secure a diversity of experience. The exception is the leader of the supreme court whom is selected by the government when the previous one retires from the position.
The supreme court here is generally a lot less politicised than in the states as those things are usually delt with within parliament. Though I'm sure politics can and will play a role in some cases too.

 

[Camikaze]

We don't have governors, so I'm not sure what you mean.

Aren't Canadian provincial appointments made by the Lieutenant-Governor, and federal appointments by the Governor-General? In the same way that UK appointments are made by the Queen.

(Of course, judges aren't selected by those individuals).

Here we go, here's how the Australian government makes judicial appointments. I assume the states are each similar.

Victoria is a bit different; they advertise for their positions. Though now Carmody's gone, the Victorian judiciary are carrying the black sheep torch.

High Court appointments have a bit more politics involved than what that graphic suggests (I suppose it's subtext of "the Cabinet considers"). I think it was Mason who said that there are probably about 50 people at a time who would be qualified to be on the High Court, so the Cabinet can exercise a certain amount of choice. A few examples - French was probably helped over the line as CJ because he'd written the lead judgment in the government's favour in the Tampa case when sitting in the Federal Court, and because he was from WA. Heydon virtually auditioned for his job by going on a lecture tour preaching judicial restraint. Kirby suspects he was appointed by Keating in large part to make him shut up about the monarchy. And Edelman just happens to be a good friend of Christian Porter.

And it's not a recent phenomenon, it's always been somewhat political, e.g. Evatt, Barwick, Latham, Isaacs, Murphy, and of course, Barton.

 

[Silurian]

Aren't Canadian provincial appointments made by the Lieutenant-Governor, and federal appointments by the Governor-General? In the same way that UK appointments are made by the Queen.

Alberta does have a governor but the role is different to the US.
The role most be pretty low profile.

https://www.lieutenantgovernor.ab.ca/home.cfm/

 

[Camikaze]

Yes, that appears to be mostly similar to Australia, save that we have 7 separate crowns, so each state has its own Governor, not just Lieutenant-Governor. Appointments are similarly made by the Governor, on the advice of the Cabinet.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Aren't Canadian provincial appointments made by the Lieutenant-Governor, and federal appointments by the Governor-General? In the same way that UK appointments are made by the Queen.

(Of course, judges aren't selected by those individuals).

The term "governor" in the U.S. is basically equivalent to "premier" in Canada (or at least that's my understanding). The positions of Lieutenant-Governor and Governor-General are ceremonial positions and the people who hold them are the Queen's representatives who are appointed.

Premiers are the leaders of the party that gets the most seats in a provincial election (usually; there's a bit of a kerfuffle going on now in one of the provinces where the election results were really close). It's strictly political.

The other two positions are appointed (ie. in the case of the GG, Her Majesty appointed Julie Payette to the position on the advice of the Prime Minister).

Alberta does have a governor but the role is different to the US.
The role most be pretty low profile.

https://www.lieutenantgovernor.ab.ca/home.cfm/

All provinces have a Lieutenant-Governor. As mentioned, it's a ceremonial position, obtained by appointment. There have been a variety of people appointed to these positions. Several of the GGs in the last 20 years have been journalists, while the current GG was an astronaut.

 

[Camikaze]

So yes, that appears to be what I wrote.

 

[MaryKB]

My father is a lawyer in Ontario, and he's told me he much prefers the American system for electing district attorneys and judges, he feels it's more democratic. I guess I can see some sense, since it's sort of an American thing that public servants like judges, sheriffs, and such are supposed to serve the people and not some other authority like a monarch, but that's sort of American culture and other countries have their own unique value systems that are different, but I don't feel that makes them better or worse.

My father has had to work on cases against the Canadian government, and he feels there's a great deal of heavy corruption, almost like an aristocracy type thing going on or something, if I'm making sense?

 

[Camikaze]

Are your father's feelings supported by any form of evidence?

It seems an oversimplification to ascribe a policy of judicial appointment to an authority-loving value system.

 

[MaryKB]

I mean his feelings are his feelings, you know what I mean? He's worked in Ontario's legal system, and he's dealt with judges, members of parliament, and lawyers, and he feels from his experience they look out for each other and sort of look the other way on crimes, such as conflict of interest and such, and he love seeing how Americans do things like put federal charges on attorney generals and such. I'm just mentioning his comments he's made to me observing how Americans do things, since his perspective is an outsider from Canada and he has personal experience with Ontario's legal system.

Oh sorry, and I mean he likes how people elect those offices, he doesn't like them being appointed by a higher authority.

 

[GoodEnoughForMe]

The state of Michigan elects judges to the state supreme court by popular vote. One cool wrinkle is that judges are either incumbents nominated by a governor as part of that political party, or running as a member of a political party, but their party is not listed on the ballot. So like, this November, there are 6 judges up for two spots. All 6 of the judges are members of either the Republicans or Democrats, but the ballot does not list as such, so the voter is expected to do extra legwork. It feels entirely stupid and dishonest.

Electing judges as a whole has been a disaster for America. It leads to extremely partisan and racially influenced decision making. Study after study has demonstrated judicial elections leads to a race to the bottom effect for being tough on crime and supporting your respective party and financial contributors only. There's a reason we're alone in this.