State Supreme Court Partisanship, 2016

2016 State Judicial Elections
2017 » « 2015
Part 1: Overview
Part 2: Supreme Courts
Part 3: Partisanship
Part 4: Changes in 2016

While influence on state supreme courts shifted in the course of 2016 elections, party control of partisan-elected state supreme courts remained unchanged. Among state supreme courts with nonpartisan elections but partisan-affiliated judges, only North Carolina and Michigan could have seen a shift of known political balance. North Carolina shifted from 4-3 Republican-affiliated justices to 4-3 Democratic-affiliated justices; Michigan's balance remained at 5-2 Republican.

Overview[edit]

Based on the seats in the seven states with partisan 2016 state supreme court elections, no court could have switched party control.

Despite this, in states with closely divided courts, the 2016 elections set the stage for the next election cycle.

Not all courts elect justices in partisan elections. In most states, justices are appointed. Of those that initially elect their justices, 16 use nonpartisan elections, while only seven use partisan elections. Nonpartisan elections vary widely from state to state. Nonpartisan elections in some states require judges to declare their partisan affiliations; in other states, judges are not required to declare a political affiliation and in fact may be prohibited from doing so. Where possible, Ballotpedia uses the available information to describe the partisan or ideological leanings of nonpartisan candidates. In Michigan and North Carolina, which both elect justices in nonpartisan elections, North Carolina's supreme court shifted balance to 4-3 Democratic-affiliated justices; Michigan's remained unchanged at 5-2 Republican.

Parties and partisan affiliation[edit]

Republican majority courts[edit]

Republicans had a majority in 2016 on four courts of last resort in three states. A partisan switch was not possible in Louisiana because in one seat, two Republicans ran for what was a Democratic seat; in the other seat, the incumbent Republican ran unopposed.

Democratic majority courts[edit]

Democrats controlled three state supreme courts in 2016:

Partisan-affiliated nonpartisan courts[edit]

Supreme court elections in Michigan and Ohio are nonpartisan, but the partisan affiliations of justices are known because justices are nominated in party conventions. In Michigan, both incumbent Republican justices were re-elected; the court's balance, therefore, remained steady at 5-2 Republican. In Ohio, a partisan switch was not possible because one incumbent Republican justice ran unopposed. Both of the other seats up for election went to Republicans, leaving the court's balance steady at 6-1 Republican.

Nonpartisan courts with partisan leanings[edit]

In Wisconsin, justices are elected in nonpartisan elections and are not officially nominated in party conventions; however, it is possible to determine the ideological leaning of each of the justices based on election endorsements and personal statements.

In West Virginia, judicial elections were partisan until a 2015 law was passed. Liberal-leaning justices held a 3-2 advantage in the state supreme court heading into the new nonpartisan 2016 elections and continued to hold it in the wake of the race.

In North Carolina, analysts observed a 4-3 conservative majority on the court. This shifted to a 4-3 liberal majority with the election of Judge Michael R. Morgan over incumbent Justice Robert H. Edmunds Jr.

2016 candidates[edit]

Of the 20 states holding partisan or nonpartisan elections, 44 seats were up for grabs.

Incumbents[edit]

See also: State supreme court elections, 2016

In the 2016 elections, 33 incumbents filed for re-election; three incumbents were forced to retire because they reached the mandatory retirement age; eight incumbents had the option to run for re-election but chose not to.

Court	Incumbents	Retiring or running?
Alabama Supreme Court elections, 2016	Kelli Wise (R) Michael Bolin (R) Tom Parker (R)	Won Won Won
Arkansas Supreme Court elections, 2016	Howard Brill Paul Danielson	Retiring Retiring
Georgia Supreme Court elections, 2016	David Nahmias	Won
Idaho Supreme Court elections, 2016	Roger Burdick Jim Jones	Won Retiring
Kentucky Supreme Court elections, 2016	Mary Noble	Retiring
Louisiana Supreme Court elections, 2016	Jeannette Theriot Knoll (D) Marcus Clark (R)	Mandatory retirement Won
Michigan Supreme Court elections, 2016	Joan Larsen (R) David Viviano (R)	Won Won
Minnesota Supreme Court elections, 2016	Natalie Hudson	Won
Mississippi Supreme Court elections, 2016	Jim Kitchens Dawn Beam Ann Lamar James Maxwell	Won Won Retiring Won
Montana Supreme Court elections, 2016	Patricia O'Brien Cotter Mike McGrath Jim Shea	Retiring Won Won
Nevada Supreme Court elections, 2016	James Hardesty Ron Parraguirre	Won Won
New Mexico Supreme Court elections, 2016	Judith Nakamura (R)	Won
North Carolina Supreme Court elections, 2016	Robert H. Edmunds Jr.	Defeated
North Dakota Supreme Court elections, 2016	Dale Sandstrom Lisa Fair McEvers	Retiring Won
Ohio Supreme Court elections, 2016	Judith Ann Lanzinger (R) Maureen O'Connor (R) Paul Pfeifer (R)	Mandatory retirement Won Mandatory retirement
Oregon Supreme Court elections, 2016	Rives Kistler Lynn Nakamoto Jack Landau	Won Won Won
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals elections, 2016	Cheryl Johnson (R) Michael Keasler (R) Lawrence Meyers (D)	Retiring Won Defeated
Texas Supreme Court elections, 2016	Paul Green (R) Eva Guzman (R) Debra Lehrmann (R)	Won Won Won
Washington Supreme Court elections, 2016	Mary Yu Charlie Wiggins Barbara Madsen	Won Won Won
West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals elections, 2016	Brent Benjamin	Defeated
Wisconsin Supreme Court elections, 2016	Rebecca Bradley	Won

Uncontested races[edit]

In the 2016 elections, 33 seats were held by incumbents who decided to run for re-election; 15 of those incumbents had no challengers in either the primary or the general election; one incumbent, Tom Parker, had a primary challenger, but had no general election challengers.

2016 trifectas[edit]

See also: State government trifectas

A state government trifecta occurs when one political party holds the following three positions in a state's government:

• The governorship
• A majority in the state senate
• A majority in the state house

A trifecta plus is a state where the party with a trifecta also enjoys control over the state's supreme court.

There are trifectas plus in five of the 50 states.

• 5 Republican trifectas plus
• 0 Democratic trifectas plus

Republican trifectas plus[edit]

The following states had a Republican trifecta plus going into the 2016 elections. This means that the state has a Republican governor, a Republican majority in the state legislature, and a Republican majority on the state supreme court.

• Alabama
• Ohio
• Michigan
• Texas
• Wisconsin
  

Trifectas in states with nonpartisan or retention elections[edit]

Below are the states with nonpartisan or retention elections, and their 2016 trifecta status.

See also[edit]

• State supreme court elections, 2016

Footnotes[edit]

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