... and, in jurisdictions that allow it, for the public to bother to research judges and vote them in our out of office.
But to really research a judge candidate I think would take access to a legal case database and a fairly sophisticated understanding of law, and far too much time.
Nobody is going speak about about Judge A because the political machinery and peer pressure are very powerful. When Judge B rats out Judge A, all of the sudden those appellate court opportunities or various other lucrative appointments suddenly are out of reach.
Judicial elections are a good way to get bad judges out and mediocre or better judges get to mostly do their thing. The places where the broader political environment is corrupt are no more corrupt than if judges were appointed. There’s the benefit with an election that the local party leaders can just opt to not support a bad judge versus making a decision to oppose him.
If any change were to be made, I think making the clerks protected civil service employees would probably blunt the judges power, particularly if cousin Rufus get appointed to be county judge because he’s drinking too much at the law firm.