Publication Date
8-30-2026
Abstract
State legislatures regularly propose and enact laws that seek to shape the substantive outcomes of state courts. These maneuvers, including court-packing, jurisdiction-stripping, and more creative changes to judicial selection or authority, would amount to legal earthquakes at the federal level. At the state level, these efforts often receive virtually no attention.
This Essay brings the potent category of outcome-shaping state court reform measures into focus and evaluates it as a question of state constitutional law. We argue that state constitutions, organized around principles of popular sovereignty, do not bar measures that align state courts with popular preferences or the public’s vision for the judiciary. But state constitutional principles do require, at a minimum, that outcome-shaping changes to state courts receive public engagement and validation. Too often today, legislatures meddle in state court decision-making while skirting or actively thwarting public engagement. More broadly, we highlight the need to recover public engagement with state judiciaries.
Recommended Citation
Bryna Godar and Miriam Seifter,
Court Reform and State Constitutions,
121
Nw. U. L. Rev.
73
(2026).
https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/nulr/vol121/iss1/4
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