Courts, Constitutional Amendments and Judicial Selection and Retention

Role of the Courts, Judicial Selection and Constitutional Amendments

The Kansas legislature has made numerous attempts to amend the Kansas Constitution in the past several years as it continues to lose school funding cases. The Kansas Constitution mandates that the legislature make suitable provision for funding public education, and we continue to hear that some legislators would like to amend the constitution to remove that requirement. There have also been attempts to change how justices are selected to replace our current merit selection process and open our judicial branch to politicization and litmus tests. There was also an attempt to amend the constitution so that it would explicitly state that only the legislature can determine funding, thus taking away the ability of the courts to force the legislature to meet its constitutional obligations. Game On believes the Gannon decision was legally correct. The constitution is not the problem; the failure to abide by its requirements is.

In 2016, we also resisted efforts to oust Supreme Court justices in retention elections in an attempt to change the makeup of the court and create an opportunity to select justices who would refuse to hold our legislature to its constitutional obligations to fund our schools. Thankfully, all justices were retained by decisive margins.

Courts, Constitutional Amendments and Judicial Selection and Retention

Role of the Courts, Judicial Selection and Constitutional Amendments

Further Reading