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Bill to create judicial performance commission draws praise and criticism over scope and politics
Summary
Senate Bill 45 would create a judicial performance evaluation commission to survey jurors, court staff, attorneys and observers and publish pre-election information for voters. Supporters said it would increase voter information and help judges improve; opponents warned it could be politicized, duplicate existing court surveys, raise fiscal and
Senate Bill 45, carried by Senator Tom McIlroy, would establish a statewide judicial performance evaluation commission to collect midterm and pre-election evaluations of judges and to publish a voter information pamphlet summarizing the commission's findings.
Sponsor intent and structure
McIlroy described the bill as a voter-education and judge-improvement measure. The proposal would create an 11-member commission (appointments by the Senate president, House speaker, governor and two by the Montana Supreme Court), a small staff, an executive director, and rules for a contracted third party to conduct anonymous surveys of attorneys, jurors, court staff and courtroom observers. The bill establishes midterm evaluations (for judge feedback) and pre-election summaries (to inform voters) and sets criteria for surveys: legal ability, adherence to precedent, clarity of writing, fairness, impartiality, avoidance of impropriety or appearance of impropriety, demeanor and courtroom preparedness among others.
Support and recommended modifications
Proponents including James King (citizen) said the bill would deter poorly qualified judicial candidates and provide voters with objective information. Supporters asked for statistically normalized reporting (for example, complaints per 10,000 residents) so voters could compare judges in jurisdictions of different population sizes.
Opposition and concerns
Opponents argued the commission risks politicizing judicial evaluation and duplicating existing court-administered surveys. John Marshall said elections themselves are a performance evaluation, asserting that this proposal would duplicate voters' role; others noted the Montana Supreme Court already publishes performance measures. Opponents including the Montana Trial Lawyers Association and tribal representatives warned the commission could be used as a political hit piece, criticized the short response allowance for judges to reply to published evaluations (200 words in the draft), and raised fiscal concerns about producing a separate voter information pamphlet and county mailing costs.
Administrative and fiscal questions
County clerks (Montana Association of Clerk Recorders) and the Secretary of State identified a technical issue: the bill's draft put the pamphlet text under ballot-issue statutes; the Secretary of State suggested a separate statutory chapter for voter information pamphlets to avoid a separate hard-copy county mailing or to include the data in the existing voter-information pamphlet to reduce county costs. Court Administrator Dave McAlpin provided the committee an existing Supreme Court performance measures packet (he noted the court has published measures for years).
Outcome
Senators asked detailed questions about composition, constitutional implications and whether the proposal duplicates or complements existing Supreme Court measures. Sponsor said he was open to technical fixes to avoid adding a second mailed pamphlet and said the commission would aggregate input from multiple sources. The hearing closed with direction to work on technical fixes and no recorded committee vote in the provided transcript.
Ending
The bill attracted robust debate from judicial-watch groups, legal associations, tribal representatives and elections administrators; committee members asked staff to explore technical and fiscal amendments.
