WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court took another step Monday toward transforming state elections for judges from nonpartisan, low-key affairs into big-money contests.
The justices let stand a lower court ruling in a Minnesota case that voids rules forbidding judicial candidates from personally soliciting money or from identifying themselves as Republicans or Democrats.
The rules were voided using the rationale that they deprive candidates of free speech. About 30 states with similar provisions could be affected if the ruling spreads beyond the U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals.
Monday's decision "could open the floodgates of money into America's courtrooms," said the Washington-based group Justice at Stake. It will "ratchet up special-interest pressure on courts that are supposed to be fair and impartial."
Minnesota sought to preserve the rules against such spending, contending they are "critical to ensuring that the state's judiciary is -- and is seen to be -- above party politics and the corrupting influences of money."
Thirty states are set to elect justices to their supreme courts this year. The court ruling comes against a backdrop of increased spending for judicial races by 45% between 2002 and 2004.
The Supreme Court decision will not necessarily have any immediate consequences in California, said Richard L. Hasen, an election law expert at Loyola Law School.
He said the decision, which left in place a ruling by the 8th Circuit, is not binding on the 9th Circuit, which handles appeals from California and eight other western states.
California's Supreme Court justices are appointed by the governor for set terms, but must run to retain their seats. Judges of the state's superior courts are elected in nonpartisan races. Some legal experts said Monday's action by the high court suggested judges and judicial candidates were now free to run partisan campaigns.
"The implication for California is that the trial court judges could run as a Democrat or as a Republican. Before, they could be disciplined for doing that," said Georgetown University law professor Roy A. Schotland, who had urged the Supreme Court to preserve the current rules for judges.
Hasen said there was nothing in the Supreme Court decision that would require California to elect judges through a partisan election.
But he said it was possible that a candidate might run a partisan campaign with the hope that the existing state law eventually would be overturned.
