However, there is no question that, for instance, United States District Courts are Article III courts, in which the officeholders enjoy lifetime tenure and salary protection. While Congress has the power to establish or abolish these offices, so long as the office exists, its holder must be given his proper Article III protections.
This is explained in Federalist 78, where Hamilton goes on at some length as to why lifetime appointment is vital: "Periodical appointments, however regulated, or by whomsoever made, would, in some way or other, be fatal to [the courts'] necessary independence. If the power of making them was committed either to the Executive or legislature, there would be danger of an improper complaisance to the branch which possessed it; if to both, there would be an unwillingness to hazard the displeasure of either; if to the people, or to persons chosen by them for the special purpose, there would be too great a disposition to consult popularity, to justify a reliance that nothing would be consulted but the Constitution and the laws."
Hamilton continues: "There is yet a further and a weightier reason for the permanency of the judicial offices. . . ."
Our Article III courts are designed to be immune from politics. Lifetime appointments more carefully assure that. Lifetime appointments allow for a better quality of judge and better law. It's simply a better system.
Are you actually suggesting that these Courts ARE immune from politics?
Lifetime appointments more carefully assure that.
BS. Has it done that to date? No.
These Judges don't have to live under the system they create. If a Federal Judge or a Supreme Court justice were given a 12 year non renewable term, then he might be a little more realistic in his decisions knowing that someday he or she may have to actually live in the society they create by their asinine decisions.
It's simply a better system.
It has proven to be a complete failure.
There is no constitutional court other than the Supreme Court.
All other courts are established by Congress. Congress has the authority to establish them however Congress so desires. That is the text of the Constitution. And it is the text that is binding. One can imagine that the text we have, and not the text we imagine, was selected for specific reasons.
1. Congress initiates and structures (ordains and establishes) everything about all inferior courts.
2. The Constitution calls for a Supreme Court only. It ALLOWS for other courts under the direction of Congress, and even these are not necessarily permanent. (”time to time” they are set up.)
3. The Scotus justices are subject to good behavior tenure. The Constitution is silent about the tenure of Scotus justices. Presumably, the Congress could pass a non-reviewable law limiting the terms of Scotus justices — GIVEN that silence.
4. Congress clearly is the body that structures all other Federal Courts. It can structure them with built-in tenure. That would not in any way violate any “good behavior” requirement.
Interestingly, the justices of many State Supreme Courts are elected officials (my own included.) These constitutions go back to the generation immediately following our US Constitution. Apparently, any logic regarding the “independence” of the judiciary being tied to lifetime appointments were neither compelling nor binding. This is interesting in that those constitutions so often reflect the national constitution in most other areas.