Court Composition and Selection
The Montana Supreme Court presently consists of a Chief Justice and six Associate Justices. The Montana Constitution provides for only four Associate Justices, but allows the Montana Legislature to increase the number of Associate Justices to six. Each justice is elected for an eight-year term in a statewide, nonpartisan election. The terms are staggered so that no more than two seats on the court are scheduled for election at the same time. When a sitting justice runs unopposed, voters cast a "yes" or "no" vote as to whether to retain them. If the seat on the court is contested, the top two vote-getters in the primary election are selected as the final candidates.
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Famous quotes containing the words court, composition and/or selection:
“At court I met it, in clothes brave enough
To be a courtier, and looks grave enough
To seem a statesman.”
—Ben Jonson (1572–1637)
“I live in the angle of a leaden wall, into whose composition was poured a little alloy of bell-metal. Often, in the repose of my mid-day, there reaches my ears a confused tintinnabulum from without. It is the noise of my contemporaries.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Judge Ginsburg’s selection should be a model—chosen on merit and not ideology, despite some naysaying, with little advance publicity. Her treatment could begin to overturn a terrible precedent: that is, that the most terrifying sentence among the accomplished in America has become, “Honey—the White House is on the phone.””
—Anna Quindlen (b. 1952)