Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) (Diego M. Radzinschi)

The 2016 election has more than 14 months to go, but the early scramble for attention has already produced a monumentally silly proposal. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, furious at U.S. Supreme Court decisions on health care and marriage, is pushing for a constitutional amendment to make Supreme Court justices stand for retention elections, in which they would be forced to campaign to stay in office.

If sending Antonin Scalia or Ruth Bader Ginsburg out on the campaign trail sounds like a Saturday Night Live skit, it’s because it would turn more than 225 years of American constitutional culture on its head. Our founders — who knew something about popular sovereignty — consciously avoided electing judges because they wanted courts’ rulings to be based on the law and the constitution, not political pressure. Imagine our justices, and the cases they decide, trapped in our 21st century political circus. Imagine them ruling with one eye on whether a Super PAC boss might approve. Imagine the nasty, misleading ads distorting their records. Imagine the justices, caught in the middle, facing daily pressure to write campaign speeches or shade their thinking or make subtle promises if they want to keep their job.