Me and the Judges, Round 2

Judicial term limits are headed back to the ballot in 2008, if yours truly has his way.  As you may remember, I disqualified myself from most judges' Christmas card lists by sponsoring last year's Amendment 40, "ten and out" for Colorado Supreme Court justices and Appeals Court judges. 

We lost with 43% of the vote, but gave the closed club of bench and bar a good scare as the state Bar Association went all-out to save the status quo, emptying its million-dollar reserve fund.  Major objections to our 2006 proposal are met in the 2008 revision, as explained in our Oct. 2 press release, full text below.

Term limits have proved popular -- and, I believe, beneficial -- for Colorado's executive and legislative branches since voters enacted them in 1990.  We're now in the anomalous situation of having our judicial branch, arguably the most powerful of the three, standing alone as the least accountable.  As a witness told a February 2007 hearing in the state House: "Judges and lawyers protect each other, and no one protects the rest of us."

The state Supreme Court's recent near-assassination of yet another citizen ballot issue on flimsy single-subject grounds (the Civil Rights Initiative barely survived their review on a 3-3 tie, with Democrat Michael Bender recusing himself) shows they learned nothing from the June 2006 firestorm over banning the Defend Colorado Now immigration petition from the ballot.

The 11 months since Amendment 40 went down have also brought sensational revelations about several judges' secret sex lives -- think Judge Edward Nottingham, ex-magistrate Grafton Biddle, and the late ex-judge Larry Manzanares -- that further shook public confidence in jurists holding the open-ended tenure currently afforded them by our meaningless retention system.

Limit the Judges, the group I chair, has a long way to go in getting the green light to circulate petitions, then a further stretch to cover in gathering 100,000 signatures and making the case for a yes vote next November.  Anything I publish here about the effort will always come with full disclosure of my personal involvement.  That said, here's our announcement of the 2008 proposal:

TERM LIMITS FOR JUDGES PROPOSED AGAIN

Press Release from Limit the Judges 10/2/07

All Colorado judges would be limited to three terms of four years each, beginning in 2010, under a constitutional amendment proposed by a citizens group hoping to qualify it by petition for the 2008 ballot.

Limit the Judges, a campaign committee headed by former Senate President John Andrews, took the first step on Tuesday toward getting its proposal approved by the Secretary of State so signature-gathering can begin.

Andrews led last year's unsuccessful campaign for Amendment 40, which would have placed a "ten years and out" limit on state Supreme Court justices and Appeals Court judges, including incumbents.  He said the revised plan differs in applying uniformly to judges all levels, raising the limit to 12 years, and excluding incumbents.

"This approach could have won in 2006," Andrews said, "especially the provisions taking in district judges and avoiding retroactivity.  We expect it will be a winner in 2008, building on more than half a million votes that we received from people who agree our courts lack accountability."

"Colorado still needs judicial reform, even though it was blocked last year by a campaign of distortion from self-interested lawyers and judges," he added. "Judges too often legislate from the bench, and we keep seeing examples of individuals with virtual lifetime appointments whose character is deficient."

Andrews noted that while judges in this state face periodic retention elections and aren't appointed for life, they enjoy a retention rate of over 99% under the current judicial performance review system, which he called "toothless."

He said his organization, Limit the Judges, is recruiting local leaders and beginning to fundraise toward a campaign goal of $2 million.

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