By Anthony M. Anastasio
The Chief Justice of New Jersey’s Supreme Court currently has the responsibility to choose the best sitting lower court judges to serve in our state’s critically important Appellate Division. However, a proposed constitutional amendment coming out of Trenton threatens to sow discord into New Jersey’s court system by politicizing this process, giving the governor and the state Senate the power to select appellate judges.
While this may seem like an esoteric matter, this proposed amendment will subject our state’s appellate courts to the same in-fighting that recently led to historic numbers of judicial vacancies and massive backlogs in our trial courts. When our elected leaders leave judgeships unfilled, justice is delayed and denied for New Jersey’s families, workers, consumers and businesses.