More Independence for the FISA Court (Changing How Judges Chosen)
More Independence for the FISA Court
By THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Published: July 28, 2013
All 11 of the current members were assigned to the court by Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. In the nearly eight years he has been making his selections, Chief Justice Roberts has leaned about as far right as it is possible to go. Ten of those 11 members were appointed to the bench by Republican presidents; the two previous chief justices put Republican-appointed judges on the court 66 percent of the time, as reported by Charlie Savage in The Times.
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If the surveillance court is to be considered part of the American justice system, it needs to start looking more like an actual court. For starters, there is no good reason the chief justice should have sole authority to appoint the court’s judges. Already, critics of the current system have floated numerous alternative ways for selecting FISA court judges.
One idea worth considering, offered by Senator Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut, is for each of the chief judges of the federal appeals courts to select one judge for the surveillance court.
This approach could minimize the risk of politicizing the process. A further step might be to require the chief judges’ choices to be submitted for approval to a board consisting of members of Congress with experience in intelligence matters and experts with experience in protecting civil liberties.
The professional qualifications of the judges appointed by Chief Justice Roberts are not in question. But given the extent to which the FISA court’s rulings have infiltrated our lives, it is appropriate for the public to have a voice in who sits on it.
The authority of our judiciary derives from its independence and its accountability. At the very least, the power to select the judges who are making secret law should not rest in the hands of one man.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/29/opinion/more-independence-for-the-fisa-court.html
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