Concerns about the appointment of Kansas Supreme Court justices aren’t warranted.

The system for appointing members to the Kansas Supreme Court doesn’t seem in need of repair.

Nonetheless, a Kansas University professor and some political activist groups in the state are pushing a proposal to do away with the current selection process and replace it with something they see as “more effective and more accountable.”

In a paper published late last year, Stephen Ware, a professor in the KU law school looked at how various states select their high courts and concluded that Kansas should switch to a system in which Supreme Court justices are appointed by the governor and confirmed by the Kansas Senate.

Currently, Kansas justices are appointed by the governor from among three candidates forwarded by the Kansas Supreme Court Nominating Commission. The nominating commission is made up of nine members appointed by the governor and the Kansas bar, which includes all practicing attorneys in the state. Attorneys in each of the state’s four congressional districts choose one bar representative to serve on the commission. The statewide bar chooses the commission’s chairman. The other four commission members, also one from each congressional district, are appointed by the governor.

The main objection Ware and his supporters have to the appointment process laid out in the Kansas Constitution is the role of the state’s attorneys, who, they say, wield too much power.

The role the state bar plays in appointing justices would be more troubling if the state’s attorneys represented a more homogenous group that could reasonably be assumed to be pushing a certain political agenda. On the contrary, practicing attorneys in Kansas and elsewhere represent a broad divergence of opinions from conservative to liberal. The positive side to having attorneys involved in the nominating process is that they are in the best possible position to evaluate the qualifications, expertise and integrity of people who are being considered for membership on the state’s highest court.

Switching to an appointment/confirmation process would provide many more opportunities for political abuses. We need only look at some of the confirmation proceedings for federal judges to see that an appointee’s qualifications too often take a back seat to the political agendas of those doing the appointing and confirming.

The primary loyalty of judges at all levels should be to the law of the land, not to anyone’s political agenda. A system where the governor appoints and the Senate confirms would put appointments entirely in the hands of partisan politicians, who easily could use those appointments to political ends.

A constitutional amendment is a serious matter. The professor and his supporters want Kansans to pursue such action when there is no evidence that a problem exists with the current process and no guarantee that the new plan would be an improvement.

It seems like a instance when it’s best to leave well enough alone.