The Politics behind Judicial Retention. The Kansas Supreme Court has seven members, with the Chief. Justice based on sen
The Politics behind Judicial Retention LEFTIST POWER GRAB is MOTIVE to KEEP JUDGES
The Kansas Supreme Court has seven members, with the Chief Justice based on seniority. Nomination to this bench comes from a commission (five attorneys and four non-attorneys) that selects three candidates, with one finalist selected by the sitting governor. If the governor doesn’t like any of the nominees, the Supreme Court Chief Justice picks one. The current state Supreme Court is viewed as quite liberal. For the first time ever in its history , it has a majority of four-members (Beier, Rosen, Johnson, Biles) who were all confirmed by the same governor. Unfortunately that governor was Kathleen Sebelius, an extremist abortion promoter. There are NO EVALUATIONS of Supreme Court as to LIBERAL ACTIVISM. In 2006, the state Legislature experimentally designated a commission to assess judicial “performance”.
The commission used nearly 3/4 million dollars to conduct a survey to a limited number of insiders, asking about judicial “temperament, communication skills and efficiency.” No analysis examines activism, i.e. whether the judges “legislate from the bench.” The commission then used that survey to promote the retention of every current judge, using an internet campaign and public service radio ads. (Unsurprisingly, judges known to be prolife/conservative were ranked less positively.)
Criticized as an ‘uncritical and overly expensive rubber-stamp’ of the judicial branch, the evaluation commission was dissolved and defunded. Several members refused to accept that the commission was disbanded and have continued in that function on their own-- without legislative authority! They now call themselves the Kansas Judicial Evaluation Committee, with added retired Supreme Court staff, leftwing attorneys and members of the pro-abortion Mainstream Coalition and League of Women Voters. RETENTION ISSUE is SMOKESCREEN for LEFT-WING POLITICS At a September 2014 “Women for Kansas” political convention pushing to elect pro-abortion candidates, several sessions were devoted to promoting this un-official new judicial ‘evaluation’ group, and how it could be used politically. Those who reject the current judicial nominating system as an unaccountable, closed-door selection system, were portrayed negatively as being “what’s wrong with Kansas” and the same people who want to “legislate morality”…i.e. , conservatives. Elitists and leftists desperately want to retain judges for continued abortion protection and judicial activism for liberal causes —but they won’t say that, pretending to be just ‘guarding against politics’. The website of the self-annointed Kansas Judicial Evaluation Committee says they want to insure “fair and impartial” courts using their survey data for an “informed citizenry.” However, the long-observed political agenda of this group’s members betray their true mission as creating a fig leaf of judicial data, aimed toward the end result in which citizens never have reasons to oust any judge.
