A Good Idea From Rick Perry?

Hendrik Hertzberg highlights a Perry suggestion for limiting the tenure of Supreme Court justices:

Yet there was more to Perry’s campaign than blunders. It was also a campaign of “ideas.” Few of them were good, alas. For example, reducing the salaries of members of Congress by half, to eighty-seven thousand dollars a year, is not a good idea. Neither is a tax cut that would net the richest one per cent more than five thousand dollars a week and the unrichest twenty per cent less than two dollars and fifty cents. Nor is there much to be said for reinvading Iraq, reinstituting torture, or unconditionally supporting new and bigger Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Yet at least one idea Perry embraced was, and is, very good indeed. It involves the Supreme Court. The Governor may be a little shaky about the Court’s names and numbers, but he knows what to do about it. Here’s the proposal, straight from his now moribund campaign Web site:

A Constitutional Amendment creating 18-year terms staggered every 2 years, so that each of the nine Justices would be replaced in order of seniority every other year. This would be a prospective proposal, and would be applied to future judges only. Doing this would move the court closer to the people by ensuring that every President would have the opportunity to replace two Justices per term, and that no court could stretch its ideology over multiple generations. Further, this reform would maintain judicial independence, but instill regularity to the nominations process, discourage Justices from choosing a retirement date based on politics, and will stop the ever-increasing tenure of Justices.

This ingenious idea has been kicking around in legal circles for decades.

Give credit where credit is due for a good idea. I didn't expect any from Perry, but I guess I was wrong. I don't think a lifetime appointment for a 50 year-old is the best idea for a part of our government with no real check on it's power and which is not answerable to the voters. I understand the value seen in lifetime appointments, but the current setup creates a strange system where the ideological bent of the court is based mainly on the timing of the judges deaths, and who gets to appoint their replacements. This would clear out the bench in a steady gradual manner and bring in new talent. 18 years is a nice long time, and you only have to fill 9 seats, so there should be plenty of people of ability to serve. That is something that term limits in state legislatures have brought to the forefront, a dearth of talent to fill open seats. I don't think this will go anywhere, but lifetime judicial appointments fits along with the electoral college as ideas from the founders which could probably use tweaked.