An Iowa grassroots movement is gaining steam to remove three of its Supreme Court justices as a “reward” for inventing a constitutional right to same-sex marriage. That effort is rattling more than a few cages nationwide, as it has even attracted the attention of the Washington Post.
Iowa uses a system that follows many other states for selecting its judges: the governor appoints them to an initial term of years, and then they must face the voters in what’s called a “retention” election. A retention election is strictly an up or down vote of “stay” or “go” – there is no one running against them. It makes a nice check and balance against the governor’s bad judgment and/or the judge’s awful performance.
Liberals who rely on courts to achieve what democratic majorities would never stand for, however, see such campaigns to oust judges as a threat to their “judicial independence” – a polite euphemism that many times means “you can’t stop us.” They are worried about the “chilling effect” it will have on judges nationwide.
Erick Erickson of Redstate.com has an answer for that: A chilling effect on judges is “exactly what this country needs.” He explains:
Yes, it is punitive. But it must be. Frankly, judges should live in fear of the people removing them from office as much as your standard politician does. The pendulum has swung too far in favor of a judicial oligarchy and while it would be equally bad to swing the whole way back to mob rule, we could stand a correction.
And it never gets old to re-quote this line from Federalist #78 at every teachable moment: “…[T]he judiciary, from the nature of its functions, will always be the least dangerous to the political rights of the Constitution….”
When the judiciary is the most dangerous branch of government, something is out of kilter.
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http://citizenlinkaol.com Geneva Howell
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Dan
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kay
