Supreme Court term limits?

[Javaman]

Before you call me crazy, hear me out.

We have had a total of 58 members of the supreme court in our nations history. For a total of 921 years of service.

The average term of service is 15.87 years. The mean term of service is 16 years.

I suggest a term limit of 15 years. This would be retro active from the day current members were sworn in.

Some presidents will get one pick others will get two, but like life itself, many a justice served less than 4 years. 8 to be exact. And 29, exactly half of those who have served never made it to the 15 year mark.

And of those who did make it past 15 years only 8 made it to the 20 year mark, 7 to the 25 year mark and 14 past that point.

I do reflect upon the concept that one will then be able to project when a particular judge retires and and new one is to be picked, thus changing the course of future presidential elections. Fine by me. Then the gravity of the presidential election takes on that much more importance. (It's not like recently retired justices haven't announced their retirement before hand thus effecting elections).

I know this cuts both ways, I know that there will be good judges that will come up to the end of their term, but the same goes for the bad ones. I also know that some of the best decisions made in this nation came toward the end of many of the past judges terms, but I will take that chance. Future events are not predictable nor can I mark on calender to plan for them.(I damn, I almost forgot, there is a revolution next tuesday, I better circle that one).

I know it would take a constitutional amendment to do this, but I'm getting tired of our country being held hostage by our own little click that is beyond reproach. I understand the reasoning as to why there were no term limits placed upon the judges when our founding fathers wrote in the constitution, but they also didn't count on the supreme court subjugating the American public over the needs of big business and corporations. It kind of goes against everything the founding fathers believed in.

[T Wolf]

1. This absolutely needs to be done. As to your point that it "cuts both ways" - there has NEVER

been a liberal justice anywhere near as far to the left as most of the reich-wing cretins are to their extreme.

At best, there have been center-reich ones who slowed the actions of the extreme-con assholes.

So, it will hurt the enemy a hell of a lot more than it will our side.

[Javaman]

3. I went to this site...

http://www.supremecourthistory.org/

[pintobean]

2. Where did you get 58?

That seemed really low, so I checked. Here's a list of 111:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Justices_of_the_Supreme_Court_of_the_United_States#List_of_Justices

Here's a list of 102, but it doesn't include the current 9:
http://www.supremecourthistory.org/history/supremecourthistory_history_timeline.htm