Judicial elections are approaching their second century in the United States, and they are not going away anytime soon. After the rise of Jacksonian Democracy in the early nineteenth century, and popular calls for increased judicial independence from the political branches, most states hard-wired the election of judges into state constitutions. Despite reform efforts that emerged in the twentieth century and continue today, states that hold judicial elections reliably reject alternative selection methods. Nearly ninety percent of state judges in the United States are subject to election.
