For many, the idea of electing a judge is an odd one. It seems strange to have judicial candidates handing out trinkets at the polling place when next they may be presiding over a court of law making decisions of a very serious nature. Yet for a variety of reasons, 22 States in the United States hold at least some competitive elections in selecting their State Supreme Court Justices. According to a new report by the Brennen Center for Justice, the volume of money being raised and spent on state-level judicial campaigns has been rising very sharply. In fact, many feel strongly that this infusion of money is undermining confidence in our very judicial system.

The graph shows the sum of all state supreme court campaign fundraising, by four-year election cycle, over a period of 19 years. The rise in fundraising is directly correlated to a rise in the quantities contributed by a small number of large donors, businesses and business groups for the most part. For more details, we recommend a close look at the source report.

Today’s market size is the quantity spent on television spots for candidates in State Supreme Court Judicial Campaigns during 2008 alone, a subset of the money presented in that graph for the years 2005-2008.

Geographic reference: United States, and more specifically, the 22 states that hold some competitive electorial process in the selection of their Supreme Court Justices
Year: 2008
Market size: $19,945,970
Source: James Sample, Adam Skagg, Jonathan Blitzer, Linda Casey, and Charles Hall, The New Politics of Judicial Elections 2000-2009: A Decade of Change, Figure 1 on page 5 and Figure 13 on page 26, August 2010, published by Brennan Center for Justice, National Institute for Money in State Politics, and Justice at Stake Campaign. The report is available online here.