People Are More Important Than the Policy

Sep 5

The Kansas judicial-selection debate was about more than judicial selection—and voters deserved greater candor from both sides.

Key Takeaways

Opponents of the August 4 judicial-selection amendment raised roughly four times as much money as supporters, but that does not prove they “bought” the election.
Much of the opposition funding came from outside Kansas. That is relevant, but it is neither inherently illegal nor immoral.
Abortion was the central policy dispute running beneath the debate over judicial accountability and independence.
Both sides would have served voters better by stating plainly what they hoped to accomplish.
Political institutions and policies should serve people. People should not become instruments for advancing a political agenda.

The Money Did Not Buy the Election

Opponents of the August 4 constitutional amendment raised approximately $13.7 million, compared with about $3.4 million raised by supporters. They also spent nearly three times as much, according to campaign-finance research compiled by Earl Glynn of the Watchdog Lab.

That is a major financial advantage. It gave opponents greater capacity to purchase advertising, organize voters and repeat their message. It is entirely reasonable to ask how that advantage affected the campaign.

It is not reasonable, however, to leap from financial advantage to the conclusion that the election was bought.

Kansas voters rejected the amendment 61% to 39%. Campaign spending may have influenced the result or widened the margin, but the contribution reports cannot tell us what would have happened if spending had been equal. Money amplifies political speech; it does not eliminate the agency of the people hearing it.

Nor is an out-of-state contribution inherently suspicious. People and organizations routinely contribute to ballot campaigns in other states when the result affects an issue important to them. Unless a contribution violates campaign-finance or disclosure laws, participation from outside Kansas is not evidence of corruption.

The Issue Beneath the Issue

The ballot question formally concerned the method used to select Kansas Supreme Court justices. Supporters emphasized accountability to voters. Opponents emphasized judicial independence and warned that elections would make judges more responsive to political donors.

Those were legitimate institutional arguments. They were not, however, the whole argument.

Abortion supplied much of the urgency, money and political energy behind the campaign. The Kansas Supreme Court’s 2019 Hodes decision recognized protection for abortion rights under the Kansas Constitution. After voters rejected the Value Them Both amendment in 2022, changing the way justices reach the court offered abortion opponents another possible route toward changing its direction.

A candid argument from supporters would therefore have sounded something like this:

We believe the existing selection system has produced a court that prevents elected lawmakers from adopting abortion restrictions and other policies their constituents support. Electing justices would allow voters to change the court’s direction.

Opponents deserved the same standard of candor:

We want to preserve a selection system that protects judges from direct political campaigns and has produced a court willing to enforce constitutional rights—including abortion rights—that we believe must be preserved.

Neither position is illegitimate merely because it advances an agenda. Political movements exist to advance agendas. The problem comes when procedural language is used to conceal the substantive result each side hopes to obtain.

Why Outside Groups Cared

The out-of-state funding becomes less mysterious when considered alongside the regional effect of Kansas abortion policy.

In 2024, 15,048 of the 19,811 abortions performed in Kansas were provided to out-of-state residents—approximately 76%. Most of those patients came from states where abortion access is far more restricted.

Kansas voters alone have the authority to determine the Kansas Constitution and the structure of Kansas courts. But the practical consequences of those decisions do not stop at the state line. Kansas has become a regional provider of abortion services, so national organizations and residents of surrounding states have an understandable interest in what happens here.

That does not give outsiders a vote. It does explain why they contributed.

The same principle applies to national conservative organizations supporting the amendment. They, too, could reasonably regard the composition of a state supreme court as part of a broader national struggle over abortion and judicial power.

Why It Matters

Agenda-based politics encourages us to judge identical conduct differently depending on who benefits from it. A contribution supporting our side becomes civic participation. A contribution supporting the other side becomes an attempt to buy the election. A court ruling we favor becomes constitutional fidelity. A ruling we oppose becomes judicial activism.

That habit prevents an honest evaluation of either the policy or the people affected by it.

The abortion debate involves Kansas voters, patients from Kansas and other states, unborn children, healthcare professionals, families and communities. Those people cannot be reduced to pieces on a political chessboard. Their interests and moral claims do not disappear because a party has selected its preferred outcome.

The appropriate question is not simply, “Which judicial-selection system will help our side win?” It is, “Which system is most likely to produce competent, independent and appropriately accountable justices who will apply the Kansas Constitution fairly—even when we dislike the result?”

My Perspective

The Republican supporters of the amendment should have been more candid that changing the court’s direction on abortion was an important practical objective. Opponents should have been equally candid that preserving the existing system helped protect judicial decisions and policy outcomes they valued.

Neither side needed to apologize for having a position. Both sides owed voters an honest explanation of it.

The larger principle reaches beyond this election and beyond abortion: people are more important than the policy.

Policies and institutions exist to serve human beings. Human beings do not exist to supply votes, validate institutions or advance a party’s agenda. Once preserving the agenda becomes more important than honestly describing it or confronting its human consequences, politics stops being public service and becomes an end in itself.

Kansas voters were entitled to hear the institutional arguments about judicial accountability and independence. They were also entitled to hear what each campaign actually hoped those institutions would produce.

That kind of candor would not eliminate political disagreement. It would at least allow Kansans to disagree about the real question.

Further Reading: https://kaninfo.com/news/how-out-of-state-money-bought-a-kansas-election/

Paul Wilson