Thread by @shrikanth_krish

One of the distinguishing features of the Supreme Court of United States is that there are no term limits. And the judges are appointed to serve for life

A sharp contrast to the Indian Supreme court where judges retire at 65.

Now there is clamour for term limits in US and also India.

But this would be a very bad idea. Why?

After all we have "term limits" for Presidents, Parliaments, Prime ministers who have to face election every few years to get back to power.

In the US, there is even a limit of two terms per President.

But the Supreme Court is different. Because it is an apolitical body

Term limits would mean - judges face the discretions of politiclans for renewal or replacement every few years. Promoting the politicization of the court.

The judges on the Court should feel comfortable to say No to the President who appointed them. Hence the life term

Term limits be it for legislature, executive or judiciary, by their very definition promote politics.

In the old world of divine right monarchy, the executive and legislature was united in a single body represented by the monarch. And they did not have term limits

The Monarch was practically like a Supreme court judge of today - a role he held for life.

Let's suppose you have a Constitution that greatly limits government discretion, then you can have divine right monarchy....Why not?

The reason we don't have divine right monarchy in the modern world, is because governments have tremendous power and discretion in our times. The hold of religion is a lot weaker than ever before. Hence we definitely need govts to answer to the people on a regular basis.

But an alternative way of arguing is -

Elections promote short-term-ism. Partisan politicking. Is Politics a good thing?

Why not have a monarch.

Let's give him all he wants and celebrate him. Eliminating the incentive for him to engage in any corruption or graft

So Representative Democracy and Elections are necessitated by the modern penchant to place a great deal of discretionary power in governments.

If the govt was truly limited and constrained, you could have monarchs for life. It is not such a bad idea

Our Courts remain the last frontier not yet conquered by Politics. At least there is a pretence of the courts being apolitical.

The apolitical nature make life terms possible. And the life terms in turn enable the apolitical character. The two reinforce each other.

An extreme conservative view would be to oppose Politics altogether.

Let's have a religious law for eternity.

Let the affairs of men be governed by individual enterprise.

The govt should have no role in the economy. At best its role is to defend the borders and law & order

In that hypothetical scenario, we don't need "Elections". All we need is a monarch revered by the people, and a hereditary succession.

Politics and term limits and Elections arise from the "Original Sin" of giving up individual liberty and surrendering a part of it to the State

This conservative view is somewhat reminiscent of the Puritanism of Boston which greatly influenced the American conservative tradition of limited government.

A country like India may have traditionally lacked a uniform religious law mandated by scripture.

However even in the Indian tradition, one can think of varNa vyavastha and varNAshrama dharma as providing a paradigm for governing the affairs of men.

If the adherence to that paradigm were total, then what you get is a weak state vested with limited discretionary power

So such a set up is not quite John Winthrop's City upon a Hill.

Nevertheless it is still a society governed by an eternal law. Limiting human discretion.

We can have divine right monarchy in that set-up with v limited downside risk

The Original sin occurs when you deviate from that eternal law. And start placing faith in human discretion to "improve" things. To innovate. To create new institutions. Tinker with the "system"

That's not a bad thing necessarily. But then you need Governments.

And not just limited monarchies. But full fledged governments with bureaucrats, officials, discretionary will.

That leads to abuse of power. Necessitating checks, balances, elections.

And yes, we need political parties too

All of that is very much essential once you embrace the original deviation from the "eternal law".

After all, even that arch conservative Edmund Burke defended political parties. They cannot be avoided.

But what I am saying is - there is an alternative to all this if we chosen to honor the religious law (in the western tradition) or the "eternal Dharma" (in an Indian context), and exercised total liberty ceding not an inch to the "State" within the bounds dictated by that law.

But we have deviated too far from that Garden of Eden so to speak.

So there is no going back from politics and elections.