It's bad enough that justice appears to be for sale in Pennsylvania judicial elections. But maybe the mounting expense of campaigns will finally spur reform.
With so much cash flowing into statewide judicial elections, there is no time to waste in changing the way judges are selected for the appellate bench.
Proposals unveiled last week in Harrisburg point the right way: They would switch to merit-based appointment for the appellate courts, while still preserving voters' right to have their say.
The price tag for electing judges to these courts has gotten too high to delay this reform any longer.
Nearly $8 million in campaign donations was spent on last year's contest to fill two seats on the state Supreme Court - jobs that pay $175,236 a year.
Voters have told pollsters that such lavish campaign spending creates the impression that justice is available to the highest bidder.
Some excellent judges have been elected under the current system, but the amount of money being spent to win office undermines public confidence in the courts.
And that's not good for any democracy.
The record spending in the Supreme Court race should tip the scales of public opinion on reform in selecting judges.
Already, the state is an outlier - an oddball, even - in that it's one of a handful that still pick all judges through partisan elections.
But the question is whether enough state legislators are ready to join Gov. Rendell and legal reformers in restoring confidence through merit-based appointment.
Along with the Supreme Court, the selection process would change for the Superior and Commonwealth Courts. A judicial commission with broad-based membership would recommend candidates to the governor, whose choices would have to go before the state Senate to be confirmed.
The commission would screen candidates based on legal experience, scholarship, judicial temperament and ethical standards.
Candidates' qualifications often play a minimal role in contested judicial elections in which voters have little time or inclination to focus on such criteria.
Too often, voters are instead motivated by regional loyalties or even the apparent ethnicity of a candidate's surname.
Diversity is important - in terms of gender, race, or geography - but a merit-based selection process would provide guidelines to achieve those goals, while placing emphasis on who would be best for the bench.
Critics of merit-based appointment repeatedly misrepresent the reform as one that deprives voters. But voters would have to approve the new process for picking appellate judges through a constitutional referendum. Then they would get to vote on whether to retain each judge once appointed.
It's a much better method.