Justices Signal Support for Delaware’s Balanced Courts (2)

The U.S. Supreme Court seemed likely to reinstate Delaware rules requiring a politically balanced state judiciary, which the state argues are responsible for the “First” state’s outsized role in American corporate law.

The Philadelphia-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit had struck down longstanding state laws requiring that certain courts be composed of more or less equal members of the Democratic and Republican parties.

But the majority of justices during oral argument Oct. 5 signaled they didn’t seem to think the rules unconstitutionally prohibited Independent and third parties from judicial service on Delaware state courts.

States have a ...