Politics
The measure is the only question on the ballot in the state.
An amendment to the New Hampshire constitution is on the ballot this November, concerning the state’s mandatory judicial retirement age.
To make an amendment to the state constitution, the measure must first pass the state’s House and Senate with 60% majorities. This measure to raise the mandatory judicial retirement age from 70 to 75 did so, putting it on the ballot before voters in the 2024 election.
Now, the constitution will be amended if 67% of voters support changing the judicial retirement age.
What would the measure do?
The New Hampshire Increase Mandatory Retirement Age for Judges Amendment will be on the ballot on Nov. 5 as a legislatively referred constitutional amendment. It will be the only question on the ballot in the state.
The measure would amend the state’s constitution, which currently prohibits people over the age of 70 from serving as a judge in a court in New Hampshire. If passed, the retirement age would be increased to 75.
The amendment was introduced as Constitutional Amendment 6 to the New Hampshire General Court in 2022 and passed the New Hampshire State Senate in March 2023.
The case for the amendment
Rob Lynn, R-Windham, who co-sponsored the amendment with Donna Soucy, D-Manchester, is a former chief justice of the New Hampshire Supreme Court.
At the time the constitution was written, Lynn said, the average life expectancy was 38.
The life expectancy at birth in New Hampshire is now 78.5 years, according to the CDC.
“When it was first enacted, the age limit had very little in the way of practical consequences because not very many people lived to 70,” Lynn told Boston.com. “Now it does have pretty significant consequences.”
Seventy, Lynn said, is “too young in this day and age.”
“They may not be able to run a marathon, but in terms of their mental faculties, they’re just fine,” he said. “I hope that people will see the wisdom of doing this and will make it this modest increase in the age that judges can serve.”
The case against the amendment
Joe Alexander, R-Goffstown, voted against the amendment.
“This is blocking the national progression of things when the next generation takes over in some of these judicial positions,” he told Boston.com.
Legislators voted to pass the amendment almost unanimously, Alexander said, “so it’s really up to the voters to make this decision.”
He said it is a “high bar” to change the state’s constitution.
Likely voters are “generally unfamiliar with and don’t understand the proposed constitutional amendment” and “very few plan at the moment to vote in favor of it,” according to a UNH poll released last month.
Fifty-eight percent of likely voters said they knew “nothing at all” about the amendment, and 15% said they would vote for it, the survey found.
How it compares to Mass.
In Massachusetts, a judge appointed on or after Jan. 2, 1975, is required to retire at age 70.
Originally, the 1780 Massachusetts Constitution gave judges lifetime appointments with no age limit, but a 1972 amendment changed the age to 70.
As of 2023, 31 states and the District of Columbia had mandatory retirement ages, according to Ballotpedia. Most of the retirement age requirements are somewhere between 70 and 75, but Vermont has the highest at 90 years old.
The New Hampshire state amendment would go into effect if and when the secretary of state announces that they received the requisite number of votes.
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