Litigation

Ballot Proposal Would Alter CO Merit Selection

By Peter Hardin

A proposed ballot initiative for 2012 would revise Colorado’s merit selection method for choosing judges, and it has elicited concern from the president of the Colorado Bar Association.

Under the proposal, judicial appointees would be required to win confirmation by the state Senate, according to a Denver Post article. In addition, appellate judges would be limited to serving 12 years on the bench and the number of Colorado Supreme Court justices would be reduced from seven to five. Judicial terms would be reduced from 10 years to four years for justices.

“It injects more politics into the system,” Chuck Turner, the state bar association president, told the newspaper about the proposal.

But Douglas Campbell, one of two people who filed the proposed ballot initiative, said he didn’t believe confirmation hearings would politicize the judicial selection process, and he contended “modest” changes are needed to Colorado’s system.

The governor currently appoints judges from a list of people recommended by a nominating commission, and they stand for (up-or-down) retention elections later. The proposal would permit the governor to make an appointment from outside the commission’s list.

A group called Clear the Bench Colorado has been seeking to unseat several justices in retention elections this year. The group is unhappy about decisions that have involved property taxes,  eminent domain and congressional redistricting (see Gavel Grab). The proposed ballot initiative represents another effort “to seriously alter Colorado’s judiciary system,” the Denver Post reported.

Full post as published by The Gavel on July 06, 2010 (boomark / email).