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Direct Election of State Judges

Preserving American Freedom > Reforming the Judicial System > Direct Election of State Judges
Texas should transition to merit appointments and retention elections for state judges.We support our right to select our judges by direct vote.

Straight party ticketing, not the candidate's merit, decides downballot elections like judges. On presidential election years, judges are elected only if they are in the same party as the president who carried their jurisdiction. Exceptions are rare. This is a terrible way to elect an important position.

Furthermore, the need to raise money corrupts judicial independence.

Texas Supreme Court Chief Justice Jefferson (R) says: "(T)he State of our Judiciary will be made stronger if we appoint our judges based on merit, and hold them accountable in retention elections," Jefferson said. "To those who say we cannot achieve this lofty goal, I have three words: Yes we can." (source) Former Chief Justices Hill (D) and Phillips (D) share the desire for merit appointments.

Former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor says: "If I could do one thing to protect judicial independence in this country, it would be to convince those states that still elect their judges to adopt a merit selection system ..." (source)

The current system of elected judges is awful and cannot be retained.

Fault:

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Random plank

Preserving American Freedom > Honoring the Symbols of Our American Heritage > Flag Desecration
Any form of desecration of the American Flag is an act of disregard for our nation and its people and penalties should be established for such.
Reason:

Annoying speech is still protected speech. It is a dangerous precedent to establish politically correct forms of free expression. That's copying a tactic of despotic regimes like Iran, Iraq, North Korea, and Cuba.

What is absent from the larger debate is the flag is a symbol. Nobody died for a symbol, they died for what it represents.

Enacting this amendment defiles what the flag represents: curtailing free speech is orders of magnitude more harmful than desecrating a symbol.

bad precedent, pointless

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