Week 5

Why am I thinking this? I started my walk with the question in my mind of whether or not certain elected offices in the United States, such as local offices of town trustee, county clerk, county judge, etc., continue to be elected offices in many states or become appointed offices. As I walked, I began to think of a few main points as to why electing these offices should remain. One is that the local population should have some kind of say in their government, with the United States having a very long tradition of elected local offices, strengthening this tradition. As I walked up a hill, I thought of whether these offices were no longer elected positions, and who should appoint them? For an office like county sheriff or county clerk, it may be argued that the county commissioners should be able to appoint such jobs. As the hill leveled off, I began thinking that it would be valuable to look at different states and how they handle the question of election versus appointment of certain offices. This led me to think of elected judges and elected members of state supreme courts. This practice clashes with the nature of federal court judges and members of our nation’s Supreme Court being appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate. I picked up my walking pace and thought of possibly the value of a similar system on the state level, where local and state judges could be appointed by the Governor and confirmed by the state Senate instead of directly by the voters. As I rounded a bend, it occurred to me that a likely strong reason for the continued practice of electing local and certain state officials is due to tradition, and just because nobody has made a compelling case for any other system. As my walk came to its conclusion, I realized that I had many more questions than answers, and that all the answers would likely need to be created by a larger group of qualified individuals than had been assembled yet. I feel like Rousseau is that I don’t have many great things to say about this walk.

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