SJR34 (House Committee Substitute) would, if approved by voters, amend the Oklahoma Constitution by granting the Governor the power to nominate and appoint all judicial officers with the advice and consent of the Legislature.

The House failed to pass SJR34 on April 16, 2024, by a vote of 36 to 60. We have assigned pluses to the yeas because the 15-member Judicial Nominating Commission, which includes six publicly unelected members of the Oklahoma Bar Association, functions as a nepotic scheme to circumvent representative government “of, by, and for the people.” Article IV, Section 4, of the U.S. Constitution guarantees “to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government,” meaning government limited to the “rule of law,” with a separation of powers among members of the legislative, executive, and judicial branches, each of whom derives their authority from the people. Yet, Oklahoma’s judicial system is only as good as it applies “the supreme Law of the Land.” Our federal system of checks and balances was designed so that no person may legitimately be appointed to any non-elected public office apart from having been nominated in good faith by, or confirmed with the consent of, at least one of the elected bodies of government.