John T. Broderick Jr. is the former dean of UNH Franklin Pierce School of Law and the founder of the Warren B. Rudman Center for Justice, Leadership and Public Policy. He formerly served as Chief Justice of the New Hampshire Supreme Court.

Remember when very few people knew the names of U.S. Supreme Court Justices? I do.

And if you did know their names you knew very little else about them. The only political focus visible to the public in their nomination process was the party affiliation of the president who selected them. It was all pretty tame. That was to be expected because, after all, they were not going to be involved in the political fray and had few friends or enemies there.

They were often scholars, esteemed lawyers, lower court judges or public servants. They were to be judges and not political leaders. We would only hear their often-forgotten names and voices through their decisions and only if those affected a lot of us. After their short-lived notoriety following their selection and confirmation, they tended to recede into their black robes and somehow meld into a new, collective identity: the U.S. Supreme Court.

Until 1981, the Supreme Court was all men. Their Senate confirmation hearings weren’t televised until Justice Sandra Day O’Connor’s that year. Her televised hearing was understandable because her nomination was historic. She was treated with respect by members of the Senate Judiciary Committee who passed her name on to the full Senate for confirmation.

After little discussion, none of it heated nor partisan, she was confirmed by a unanimous vote. No senators tried to raise money off her nomination and she did not enter federal judicial service disparaged and wounded from her televised hearing. To the contrary, she was widely admired, and she had earned it.

Looking back all these years later, it is hard to imagine America was ever that respectful, that patient and that dignified.

Justice O’Connor was a conservative Republican and I was a lifelong Democrat. But she seemed smart, practical, non-ideological, honorable, flexible, human and well-qualified. That she didn’t share my party affiliation didn’t disturb me. Decades after her hearings, I had the unexpected privilege to invite her to Franklin Pierce Law School at UNH where she received an honorary degree. I will always remember our private breakfast at the Centennial Inn the next morning. She was a legendary justice. I felt privileged to meet her.

Fast forward to Wisconsin in 2025. How far we’ve fallen.

My comments don’t relate to the two candidates running for that Supreme Court seat because that’s how those posts are acquired there. My comments relate to the regrettable spectacle of it all. The partisan nature of the fight, the commercials, the endorsements and the obscene amount of money spent there — almost $100 million. That sort of money spent on electing judges should shake anyone’s confidence in the justice system.

Does anyone believe people are donating to those campaigns for fair and impartial justice or is it for more immediate legal, political and cultural agendas? Is judging just another political forum? And, if not, how can you tell in Wisconsin and many other states where judges are elected? Perception is just as important as reality in the judging business, perhaps it’s more important for public trust.

The disturbing image of out-of-stater Elon Musk parading around stages, arms raised, adorned as a cheesehead to ingratiate himself to people he doesn’t know or ever want to know and handing out $1 million checks to turn out the vote is a difficult image to shake. He put $20 million of his own money into his failed efforts to nationalize a judicial election for partisan purposes.

New Hampshire should be proud of how it selects judges and the life tenure it grants them as shields from the political winds and political pressures of the day. I served on our Supreme Court for 15 years, so I know something about that. Doing justice is not always popular nor always easy, but isn’t that just the point? During my tenure, my job security was never tied up in your justice. Wisconsin might want to try that.

New Hampshire’s judicial selection system is not perfect but its appointment process is public and transparent. The only money I spent when I was nominated to our Supreme Court was on highway tokens to visit members of the Governor’s Council who wanted to meet me before my confirmation vote. And I never had to worry about an Elon Musk.