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96 Judicature 151 (2012-2013)
The Political Origins of Judicial Elections: Evidence from the United States and Bolivia

handle is hein.journals/judica96 and id is 151 raw text is: THE POLITICAL ORINS OF JUDICIAL EVIDENCE FROM THE UNITED STATES AND BOLIVIA Compar ve antysi s of the adoprnon and imp/c entation of jud cial e1ectionis in Boliva and ilc ' 'S Te stuidy ;dentf7s four commona17ties betwecn the UlS. adoption of judidi! dlec/ions in thie 1800s and the racent Polivklln move to jud/cia/ elections. AMANDA DRiSCOLL and MICHAEL J. NELSON judicial elections have been des- cribed as a uniquely American insti- tution? Initially adopted by a handful of states in the mid-1800s, judicial elections quickly diffused across the country as many U.S. states began rewriting their state constitutions. By 1860,21 of the 30 American states elected their judges.' Today, the vast majority of judges in the United States must stand for election.' Yet, while the American legal style is going global, judicial elections are rarely used to select or retain judges outside of the United States., With the adoption of its new con- stitution in 2009, Bolivia became the first country in the modern world to use judicial elections to select judges for courts with national juris- diction. On October 16, 2011, Boliv- ian citizens cast ballots to elect 56 judges to the Bolivian Supreme Court (Tribunal Supremo de Justicia), the Plurinational Constitutional Tribu- nal (Tribunal Constitucional Plurt- nacional), the Bolivian Agricultural Court (Tribunal Agroambiental), and the high administrative body of the national judiciary, the Bolivian 1. led Shugerwnan, Economic Crisis and the Rise of judicial Elections and Judicial Review, 123 H ARVAN L. RE. 1061-1150, 1064 (2010). 2. Roy A. Schotland, Myth, Reality Past and Present, and judicial ilectons 35 INn. . RatI 6s9-667,661 (2002). 3. Jeffrey Rosinek, Some Thoughts on the Prob- lems of judicial Elections, 41 COURT REV. 20-24 (Summer, 2004). 4. R. Daniel Kelemen and Eric C. Sibbitt, The Globalization ofAmnerican Law, 56 INT'L ORG. 103- 136,131 (2004). Outside of the United States, the direct election of judicial authorities is rare and generally reserved only for courts with limited jurisdiction. The most prominent exception comnes from Japan, whose Supreme Court judges are subject to retention elections. To date, no Japanese judge has ever lost an election. David S. Law, The Anatomy of a Conservative court: judicial Review injapan, 87 Tx. L. REV. 1545-1594 (2009). wwwS.RG* i11CJIJE 1.51

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