A Judge’s Case Against Merit Selection
April 18, 2008
Earlier this week, I linked to a great opinion piece by a Tennessee lawyer laying out the case against that state’s so-called “merit selection” scheme.
Here’s another great argument against the “lawyers choose, voters lose” plan — from Judge Dale Workman of Tennessee who has observed the closed-door secret selection process first hand.
“Merit selection” proponents like to say their plan will eliminate all the “grubby” politics from the judicial selection process. Tell that to Judge Workman, who says:
“After 18 years on the trial bench I have seen the Commissioners under the Tennessee Plan make the selection of judges the most partisan politics in the history of the state. This has never been ‘merit selection.’ There is less politics in almost any other method.”
Stacy Campfield’s blog, camp4u, has Judge Workman’s full statement.
Posted by Dan Pero in the categories: State Battlegrounds, Tennessee
2 Responses to “A Judge’s Case Against Merit Selection”
[...] Whitehouse has a piece up about an event that may serve to amplify the current debate over how we select judges in Tennessee. Click here if you are having trouble reading the [...]
[...] Baloney. The politics just go behind closed doors as I and others have pointed out before (here here, and here). Whatever system is used for choosing judges — judicial elections, the Federal [...]