The idea that judges shouldn’t be elected is deeply rooted in the reactionary ideology of an aristocracy that believed the masses shouldn’t be trusted with any decisions that actually matter and should be regarded with suspicion instead of trusted with decisions.
Judges shouldnt be elected for the same reasons surgeons shouldnt be elected.
This logic can be applied to lawmakers too.
What’s the difference?
Legislators are there to directly reflect the opinions and interests of their constituents, judges are there to have expert knowledge of the law and how it applies to each case uniquely. The first needs some form of democratic mechanism to ensure that they represent people’s current opinions, the later needs a meritocratic mechanism to ensure they are experts in the correct fields.
If judges were the only element of a court I would agree that it would be problematic to have no democratic input, but in common law systems at least that element is represented by juries who are the most powerful element of a court case as they are unchallengable arbiters of fact and drawn through sortition which is even more democratic than election.
This is ideology. There’s no material mechanism to actually ensure judges are experts or have merit. They’re just picked by politicians, who themselves are selected democratically rather than by merit.
This just cuts out the middlemen. If the selection process is unable to select for merit, then it might as well be democratic.
The UK has an independent Judicial Appointments Commission.
Which can be overruled by an elected official but generally is directed to pick on merit and allowed to do so.
Allowing professionals to pick experts and only stepping in when there is a problem is much better to me than direct elections which quickly become partisan and obstructive to professional candidates.
All it takes is getting a few panel members with an ideological axe to grind and suddenly the selection process for judges and the JAC panel itself becomes politicized in that particular direction.
But furthermore, the very framework of law is political. You can’t actually non-politically adjudicate disputes or reviews or appointments or dismissals, there are always political underpinnings and ideological assumptions embedded within the process. The very fact that they currently “particularly welcome applications from ethnic minority candidates and Welsh speakers” is political, and acknowledges that it is political and ideological and not truly objective.
Law isn’t math.
An attempt to be representative is not equal to being “political”.
It’s actually a strength of the system that minorities get some representation rather than being always voted into zero representatives. And they still have to pass the standards to be considered as experts in the field.
No system is perfect, but look at America. Small area elections for judges produce poor corrupt picks. Large area elections produce partisan fights with extremists campaigning against each other.
There’s no country which is a good advert for directly electing judges.
This is probably the worst option. Judges should be professional and not populists pandering to the public.
What? Democratically appointed judges? That’s amazing , wonder why the US hasn’t thought of this? Ohh right that’s because we give way too much power to the one in office. This is great for Mexico now the US needs to do this.
Pssst, your ignorance is showing.
The civilians won’t pick the candidates, the state will (different parts of it, but all of them under the control of Morena) and then they’ll use the civilians to vote for them and then frame it as if it was the will of the people. You know, populism.
Also the narcos are REALLY happy about this change, because the candidates are going to need money to campaign and they could always use a hand in higher places (even if the president protects the narcos already).
It doesn’t touch the police problem at all or the security problem, but it allows Morena to fill the magistrate with their people regardless of their studies, they can even put criminals in there (search for the history of any Morena member, they have murderers, thiefs, pedos and rapists).
Now tell me… What does this change fix? Besides “now people can vote for Morenas picks!”.
