I've tried making that point before. A law or practice can be bad without it running afoul of the Constitution. The solution to a problem may not be the courts -- it is the legislature, or a private individual, company, or organization.

That's why the US Supreme Court ruled as it did.

If it's possible for Supreme Court justices to uphold a law while holding their noses, that's what happened yesterday when the court delivered a unanimous victory for party bosses and "smoke-filled rooms" in New York.

The state's convoluted process for electing trial court judges may discourage outsiders, empower party bosses and even be bad policy, the court said, but it is constitutional.

"None of our cases establishes an individual's constitutional right to have a 'fair shot' at winning the party's nomination," Justice Antonin Scalia wrote for the court.

Challengers to the system have asserted that it is almost impossible for a candidate to be elected as a New York Supreme Court judge -- the name the state gives its trial courts -- without being a party nominee. Since 1921, the state has allowed the parties to employ a complicated system of petitions, delegates and conventions to choose their nominees for the general election, a process that gives great sway to party leaders.

Overall, it sounds like a bad system. It does not, however, constitute a violation of the Constitution. Even the New York Times reluctantly concedes as much, noting that some of the justices quoted Thurgood Marshall's observation that “The Constitution does not prohibit legislatures from enacting stupid laws.”

A stupid — and undemocratic — law is precisely what New York has. Now that the cudgel of a court order has been removed, we hope the Legislature will summon the wisdom and integrity to fix the system voluntarily.

The odds of that happening are long, since the powers that be in the Legislature are the same ones that profit from the current corrupt system. It is, however, a cause that everyone who cares about a qualified and independent judiciary needs to keep fighting.

The new York Legislature needs to fix the system. here's hoping the people put the pressure on the legislature to do so in a way that allows them more meaningful participation in selecting the state's judges.

Posted by: Greg at 11:15 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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