Every year while I was in the legislature, the Archbishop of the St. Louis Archdiocese invited me and my family to attend the Red Mass. This is a picture of me with one of my favorite judges, Dan Pelican, and his wife after a Red Mass in St. Louis.
We should be satisfied that we get to vote on whether to retain them, but what good is a vote when it’s so hard to know what we are getting? Because of their “professional courtesy”, most judges won’t even offer their thoughts about other judges. It’s nearly impossible to make an informed decision.
As a result, the vast majority of the judges are retained, regardless of their behavior. For a judge to be removed from the bench would take a scandal so big, we would hear about it for weeks on the nightly news. Since Missouri developed it’s non-partisan court plan only two justices have ever been removed.
The Missouri Non-Partisan Court Plan allows the Governor to appoint judges and the people can vote every 12 years on whether they should be retained of not. The people in our state don’t have an opportunity to select our judges. It might sound like a great idea on paper, but when a system removes the selection process from the people, we lose a slice of our power.
Most of the time when the voters are confronted with a candidate or issue they don’t understand, they will vote for it anyway. The default position should be to vote no unless the candidate or issue earns our votes.
In discussions with other leaders of the Conservative movement, we conclude it’s best to vote against all of them unless there is one reason why one is especially good. Here’s a video that explains it.
We want judges who are constitutional. Therefore, using a rating system from the legal bar association is of no help because they don’t apply any standard for constitutional adherence. Most lawyers tend to lean to the left, so the approval from their colleagues of the bar association only tells us the names of their friends. The only way to judge the judges is to look at court decisions, which would require one to sit in their courtrooms nearly all the time.
The League of Women Voters put together a handy sample ballot here:
I cannot support the retention of Supreme Court Justice Richard Teitelman because of he has a history of taking distinctly left-wing positions, especially when it involved homosexual perversion. However, last time he was up for a retention vote, the voters sent him back regardless.
I am voting to retain Philip Hess because he took a correct position on child pornography. However, we know nothing about James Dowd. It is possible for a left-leaning governor to appoint someone who rules with Constitutional restraints, but unless we sat in the judge’s courtroom every day, it would be nearly impossible to determine that.
If you missed our analysis of Ballot Issues last week and want to catch it again, click here:
You will be inspired to hear Candidate for Governor, Les Turilli. We did an interview with him on Home Front. He left me inspired by how he is unafraid and unashamed of his faith.
What are your thoughts on the judges? Let me know by leaving a comment below.
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