State not increasing judges age limit

COLUMBUS (AP) — Vot­ers in Ohio have decided against rais­ing the age limit for judges from 70 to 75.

They upheld a 1973 law that capped judi­cial age at 70, under the phi­los­o­phy that age can affect judg­ment and there­fore older judges should be forced to retire.

Defeat poten­tially affects 10 per­cent of sit­ting judges over the next six years. The issue went down despite the endorse­ment of Chief Jus­tice Mau­reen O’Connor, who appeared in ads sup­port­ing a yes vote. She argued peo­ple are now liv­ing and work­ing longer, and older judges offer valu­able expe­ri­ence. Oppo­nents included an asso­ci­a­tion of county prosecutors.

The bal­lot mea­sure would have amended Ohio’s con­sti­tu­tion to allow judges to serve longer.

Posted by Becky Brooks on Nov 9 2011. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.