Electing judges doesn’t really make sense to me. Are people supposed to dig up every court case they’ve ruled on? (Or for prospective new judges, every case they’ve represented in as a lawyer?)
(I’m in USA Btw; Does any other country even “elect” judges? Such a weird thing IMO.)
We don’t elect judges in France, it seems weird. And yes they are supposed to be neutral, even if they are supposedly left-leaning in France for some reason (I would expect the opposite actually with lawyers being on the left to protect people and judges on the right to punish).
So, you can see how they’ve made rulings on various topics. All of that is public record.
What really happens is people make lists and say “we like this judge” for various interests, or like news agencies might give an overview of what they found on rulings, etc.
IMO it is a bit weird since it makes them political, but they’re going to be political anyways, since the alternative in the US is appointing them. (See, for example, SCOTUS nomination hearings.)
SCOTUS being appointed isn’t exactly the issue. It’s the fact that only the senate can give input, and since the senate favors the right wing, its composition is biased. House has no say in this, and that’s not very balanced.
Also 9 judges is too few, easily flipped in 1 administration we saw in 2017-2021.
Technically, you can give your senator some input and tell them how to vote. They can also call in witnesses and get commentary.
The point about scotus being appointed is that it’s still a political process, they’re still doing politics.
Of course, studying the performance of individual judges is criminalized in France, so we have very limited ability to know about their individual performance. :)
It’s a huge lie that judges are neutral, but some argue it’s a necessary lie.