Others have discussed exhaustively the merits and demerits of merit selection, and I do not intend in this essay to debate the“ success” or “failure,” per se, of merit selection since its introduction in Missouri in 1940. Instead, I wish to discuss the effect merit selection has on squelching public debate about the judiciary. Once that effect is demonstrated, I then wish to assess this antidemocratic tendency against the purported goal of merit selection: maintaining some measure of accountability in a selection system nonetheless designed to make judges confident enough in their independence to render decisions according to the law rather than the will of the public.