Our court system begins at the local level with minor courts. Our statewide court system includes Courts of Common Pleas, Commonwealth Court, Superior Court and at the top, the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. The judges of these statewide courts are elected in statewide elections.
House Bill 38 is a proposed amendment to our state Constitution that was passed in 2020 and needs passed again this year, then voted on in a statewide referendum. HB 38 proposes to elect judges for our statewide courts by district rather than statewide.
There have been no advance notices, no public hearings and no expert testimony for or against this bill. No plan has been put forth describing how these districts would be created, opening the door to that bugaboo called gerrymandering, the system of creating districts favoring one political party over another.
The Pennsylvania AFL-CIO, the League of Women Voters, Women’s Law Project, Fair Districts, the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania, Common Cause and the bar associations of Philadelphia and Montgomery County all say HB 38 should be rejected. It is time to tell your legislator to reject HB 38, too.
Carole A. Briggs
Brookville