Amendment would subject judges to even more political pressure

Judge Noel Wise from Alameda County wrote a "Guest Column" article titled "Keep Judges out of Politics." In said article, Judge Wise appeared to advocate for removal of the ability to allow for challenges of sitting judges at the end of each of their six-year terms. I wholly disagree with Judge Wise's position.

As a 20-year veteran of the Los Angeles County Superior Court as a judicial assistant, I hold no office in higher regard nor have more respect than for the judges (and commissioners) of the superior court who have the unenviable task of having to, on a daily basis, navigate overloaded caseloads, make difficult decisions based upon imperfect evidence, and sometimes unclear law and court rules, and then have to often deal with the reality of insufficient resources for parties in all fields while supervising cases, whether it be family law, civil criminal or juvenile law (both delinquency and dependency), all of which I have served in.

That being said, I am appalled that Judge Wise would advocate for the removal of the ability of the constituents that the judges serve to challenge them in a fairly-held election. To do that would take away from the independence and integrity of the office which Judge Wise holds and the judiciary as a whole.

First, any such amendment would actually increase political pressure for bench officers as, instead of facing challengers, they would face even greater pressure from the Legislature, from whom they are supposed to be independent, due to the impeachment threat as the only potential threat to their hold on their office. As the recent recall of Judge Aaron Persky brought to light, a recall of a sitting judge had not previously occurred in more than 80 years. That recall petition was only brought and given public prominence because of the intense and vociferous public outrage after Judge Persky's widel -unpopular decision in the Stanford rape case and the subsequent clearing of his action without discipline by the Commission on Judicial Performance.

Second, this amendment would discourage qualified judicial candidates who perhaps don't otherwise have the political influence to hold sway in Sacramento, further politicizing an office which is supposed to be independent of the other two branches of our esteemed government. How can our electorate expect the judiciary to be an independent branch when the only real threat to the continued tenure of a judicial officer Judge Wise complains of campaigns which "regularly run in the hundreds of thousands of dollars and can cost millions" and that "Californians cannot glean substantive information from judicial candidates" which force voters to either "vote without sufficient knowledge, vote based on arbitrary demographic information ... or don't vote at all." This argument again falls short, as it appears that Judge Wise would argue that the voters simply aren't informed enough and/or can't be informed well enough regarding candidates and that the cost of running an effective campaign is simply too great.

But the logical extension of this argument is then to restrict the rights of the voting public to ease the strain on a judicial officer's pocketbook and without attempting or proposing how to improve the purported lack of political savvy of voters? Simple campaign and election reform can resolve these issues. A spending cap can be introduced into judicial elections, with the candidates to disclose via public records the source of the funding which would preserve the integrity of the elections as voters would be able to determine who is funding which candidate, and the Commission on Judicial Performance can create a subdivision which submits independent evaluations for each judicial officer up for re-election and those evaluations can be printed in the voter ballot pamphlets that are mailed to each voter in each county, as currently occurs, and can be posted on the Commission on Judicial Performance's website. Individual candidates that are not already judicial officers can still submit statements as currently permitted.

In short, I wholly agree that maintaining the impartiality and integrity of the judiciary must remain a priority in governing, as it is essential to maintaining the public trust that we as public employees must safeguard daily in the performance of our duties.

However, sacrificing the rights of the voting public to save judicial officers personal expense, increase job security for judicial officers and without proposing how to increase the involvement of the voting public smacks of elitism and a personal concern for job security without preserving accountability to the voting public. One of the first lessons political science students are taught is that the first job of every elected official is to stay in office. Judicial officers can do that with outstanding performance, which I see every day in Los Angeles County. I agree, Your Honor, let's keep politics out of the judiciary.