818
Ginsburg, J., dissenting
trol neither the purse nor the sword, their authority ultimately rests on public faith in those who don the robe. See Mistretta v. United States, 488 U. S. 361, 407 (1989) ("The legitimacy of the Judicial Branch ultimately depends on its reputation for impartiality and nonpartisanship."). As the Minnesota Supreme Court has recognized, all legal systems—regardless of their method of judicial selection—"can function only so long as the public, having confidence in the integrity of its judges, accepts and abides by judicial decisions." Complaint Concerning Winton, 350 N. W. 2d 337, 340 (1984).
Prohibiting a judicial candidate from pledging or promising certain results if elected directly promotes the State's interest in preserving public faith in the bench. When a candidate makes such a promise during a campaign, the public will no doubt perceive that she is doing so in the hope of garnering votes. And the public will in turn likely conclude that when the candidate decides an issue in accord with that promise, she does so at least in part to discharge her undertaking to the voters in the previous election and to prevent voter abandonment in the next. The perception of that un-seemly quid pro quo—a judicial candidate's promises on issues in return for the electorate's votes at the polls—inevitably diminishes the public's faith in the ability of judges to administer the law without regard to personal or political self-interest.4 Then-Justice Rehnquist's observations
4 The author of the Court's opinion declined on precisely these grounds to tell the Senate whether he would overrule a particular case: "Let us assume that I have people arguing before me to do it or not to do it. I think it is quite a thing to be arguing to somebody who you know has made a representation in the course of his confirmation hearings, and that is, by way of condition to his being confirmed, that he will do this or do that. I think I would be in a very bad position to adjudicate the case without being accused of having a less than impartial view of the matter." 13 R. Mersky & J. Jacobstein, The Supreme Court of the United States: Hearings and Reports on Successful and Unsuccessful Nominations of Supreme Court Justices by the Senate Judiciary Committee, 1916-1986,
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