The Editor's Bag THE RECALL OF JUDGES ANY attempt to change the prin ciples of our system of delegated government, and to reform it along the lines of the initiative, the referendum, and the recall, is likely to be due to one of three possible causes, and may be due to the concurrent action of two or all of them. In the case of the recall of judges, the agitation, we think our readers will agree, is the result of all three together. The movement for the recall of judges is due (1) to a failure to understand the fundamental principles and whys and wherefores of the existing frame of government, (2) to possible defects in it for which a conservative and sound remedy is available, and (3) to the mod ern collectivistic movement which seeks to conform all existing institutions to a new social ideal. The New World inherited the Old World tradition that the judge's calling is highly specialized, and calls for ability of a rare order, which can come to full maturity only through lifelong experi ence. Our ancestors did not suffer from the delusion that there is danger of judges deteriorating after their eleva tion to the bench, and there is no evi dence to support such a view. A judge thoroughly competent at the outset grows stronger, rather than weaker, with experience, and there is nothing to show that he tends to become fossil ized; on the contrary, his value increases until he reaches the age when he will
either choose to retire of his own accord or be retired on part pay by operation of law. The notion that the bench tends to become encumbered with "dead wood," and that it needs frequent in fusions of "new blood," is not borne out by the actual facts. It is this very super stition, that an untried is preferable to an experienced hand, that specializa tion tends to narrow a man's horizon and that men fresh from the people make better all-round judges, which plays an important part in this agita tion for the recall of judges. It has its root in a temperamental factor which no amount of argument will circumvent. There will always, doubtless, be people who will cherish this superstition, which nothing can overcome but the sober judgment of the more prudent and in fluential class of citizens. There are, of course, defects in the existing systems of selecting judges, if only for the reason that no system can be perfect. The theory underlying the practice of all our states is that no law yer shall be elevated to the bench with out careful preliminary inquiry into his qualifications, and if this inquiry is not thorough enough now to guarantee the competence of our judges, it can be made more thorough without any radical innovations. If it were to be granted that the recall of judges would remove incompetents, what assurance would it give that their positions would immediately be filled by competent lawgivers? The conspicuous fault of
