Dear John,

Yesterday, we learned about the latest Supreme Court ethics scandal — this time involving Justice Alito failing to disclose gifts from a billionaire donor. These ongoing scandals highlight that our system of judicial accountability and checks and balances is broken.

The disconnect between the American people and the radical conservative supermajority on the Supreme Court is only intensifying. In decision after decision — on abortion rights, gun control, and climate protection — the Court is handing down decades worth of social change at odds with both precedent and public sentiment.

Put simply: no one should have this much power for this long. George Washington had that insight when he stepped down from the presidency after two terms. Public trust in the Court is at an all-time low. We are calling for a powerful tool to bring accountability back to the Supreme Court: term limits.

The United States stands virtually alone in giving justices a lifetime job. Rhode Island is the only state with life tenure for its state supreme court. Every other major democracy in the world has term or age limits for their high courts. On average, justices today sit on the bench for more than a decade longer than their predecessors did in the 1960s, accruing far more power than anyone in the founding era would have anticipated.

It’s no surprise that public support for the Court is at its lowest ever — and falling fast. This all amounts to a crisis of legitimacy of the Supreme Court’s own making as it inserts itself into the most controversial issues of our day. The notion of term limits, however, is uncontroversial. It has broad and consistent bipartisan support.

Thank you for taking a stand,
The Brennan Center for Justice