Matt LeMieux

28 April 2015

Should the US Do Away With Lifetime Appointment of Federal Judges?

By now, anyone reading this blog should have already heard me say in class that Federal judges in the United States are appointed for life. The actual language in Article III of the U.S. Constitution says that judges "shall hold their offices during good behavior," which has been interpreted to mean as long as they behave and are not removed by the impeachment process, they remain a federal judge. To say that not everyone is enamored with this setup might be a bit of an understatement. Probably since the first controversial issued by the Supreme Court way back when there have been people calling for the terms of the Justices to be limited. Kenneth Jost recently made this argument in a blog post that is well worth the read.