With the aid of a supermajority in both houses of the Kansas Legislature, Republican lawmakers are a step closer to achieving their dream of politicizing the Kansas Supreme Court.
That’s what will happen if voters approve a constitutional amendment allowing for the election of justices serving on the state’s highest court.
Of course, ultraconservatives don’t characterize it that way. They want to convince you this is all about “giving power back to the people,” as Senate President Ty Masterson gleefully declared.
Let’s be clear. Despite the claims of Republican lawmakers, the proposed change to the constitution has nothing to do with taking judicial appointments out of the hands of “elitists” and replacing it with a process that is “fair” and “transparent.”
Ultraconservative Republicans talk about trusting people to make the right decisions, but their actions don’t match their rhetoric.
When lawmakers keep enacting ways to force property tax limitations upon local units of government, they are implying that voters in cities, counties and school districts are incapable of deciding for themselves whether their tax burden is excessive and forcing local officials to respond accordingly.
Republican lawmakers are declaring they are smarter than local taxpayers — by their own definition — elitists.
But if lawmakers truly believe in the power of the people, why stop at the Supreme Court?
Let voters decide who should sit on the Kansas Board of Healing Arts. See how confident that makes you feel should you or a family member need surgery, knowing that it was voters — not qualified peers — who determined if your surgeon was qualified. This is about tipping the scales of justice even more towards the wealthy, the powerful and those who seek to take legal and human rights away from certain citizens.
Or why not let voters decide who is a city’s building inspector?
The reason we don’t is because the average voter knows little about construction and even less about medicine.
What people know, or think they know, about the law and how courts should rule is equally deficient.
No matter how much lipstick Republican lawmakers try to put on this pig, the amendment question has nothing to do with “giving power back to the people.”
Ultraconservatives are still indignant that 60% of Kansas voters in 2022 told them to keep their hands off the constitutional right of a woman to make her own decisions about her own body.
Rather than abide by the will of the people, Republicans and anti-abortion groups are taking a backdoor approach with the hope that voters aren’t paying attention.
