Chief Wallace B. Jefferson speaks on the influence of money and politics in Texas courts.

“The status quo is broken. It is time for Texas to set a high standard for judicial selection…. Your work on this issue can bequeath to all Texans the gift of courts that need labor no longer under the assumption that judicial decrees are encumbered by political or economic motives."

That’s what Chief Justice Wallace Jefferson told state lawmakers yesterday and, if anything, he might have been guilty of understatement.

If you had to pick the worst possible way to select judges, you’d let big law firms, whose attorneys try lucrative cases in their courts, bankroll their campaigns. Then you’d let you and me, who probably have no clue who is running for, say, the 68th Civil District Court seat, vote a straight ticket, as if party affiliation were any clue as to how a jurist would hear a divorce or lawsuit. Soon, low and behold, the winning judges will have nearly identical margins to whoever won the top of the ballot, whether that be Kay Bailey Hutchison or Barack Obama.

Of course, in Texas this is how we elect our judges, and few people think this is a good idea. Here in Dallas, where I am, qualified judges lose to inferior ones solely because of their party affiliation. For a long time, good Democrats lost solely because of where they were on the ballot; now good Republicans have been thrown out of office simply because they had shared a party with an unpopular president. Is it any wonder that John Creuzot, a Dallas criminal district judge, has switched party labels twice, going from a Democrat to a Republican and back to the Dems? It's not like the good judge actually decided--on two separate occasions--that his mindset was no longer in step with his party.

Yesterday, Chief Justice Jefferson brought up these issues in his address to state lawmakers, telling them our system is broken and corroded by party politics.

“So long as we cast straight-ticket ballots for judges, the fate of all judges is controlled by the whim of the political tide,” he said.

As an alternative, Jefferson proposed appointing judges on merit and then holding them accountable in retention elections, which would tend to drive more motivated and focused voters to the polls.

The chief justice also spoke on the issue of money in judicial races, noting that it raises questions about the impartiality of those who sit on the bench.

"I am concerned by the public’s perception that money in judicial races influences outcomes. This is an area where perception itself destroys public confidence," he said. "If the public believes that judges are biased toward contributors, then confidence in the courts will suffer."

H/T: Texas Weekly
Also see the Associated Press account of Jefferson's speech, posted at chron.com