Letter: Lifetime tenure of justices is a supreme error

Monday, April 1, 2002 | 8:40 a.m.

The U.S. Supreme Court decision approving evictions based on anyone in a public housing unit using a "controlled substance' is a judicial mistake well analyzed in the Sun editorial, "Zero tolerance for zero tolerance."

The internal politics behind rulings by the high court are skewed by the personal philosophies and experience of the judges, which are indirectly and sometimes not at all related to the Constitution.

Justices have life tenure, a mistake, as that saddles the country with the biases of incumbents for their lifetimes regardless of advancing age and even senility. Unfortunately, rulings of the court are set in concrete and are respected in future rulings even though recognized as seriously flawed.

There is little hope of reversing a badly flawed decision by the high court. Such decisions ought to stimulate a movement to limit tenure to a reasonable time such as 15 years. It was apparent long ago that this change in the court's charter was overdue in the interest of the court and, above all, that of the country.

What does it take to initiate a reform so badly needed? The media are now distracted by war and national security that are taking precedence over everything else no matter how urgent. In Las Vegas, the media's occupation and preoccupation with the looming threat of Yucca Mountain makes it difficult to get worked up about tenure of Supreme Court justices unless that would have a direct relation with this problem that is both local and national.

MAURICE F. MURPHY Beltsville, Md.