Two former Kansas attorneys general urged voters Monday to retain all five members of the Kansas Supreme Court on the Nov. 8 ballot and take a stand against politicization of the state's top appellate court.

Republican Bob Stephan and Democrat Steve Six said advocates of dispatching Justices Caleb Stegall, Lawton Nuss, Marla Luckert, Carol Beier and Dan Biles were intent on undermining the judicial branch's authority.

Supporters of purging at least four justices — Stegall is the lone appointee of Gov. Sam Brownback — have expressed frustration with Supreme Court decisions on school finance, capital punishment and abortion cases.

"For the past 60 years, Kansas voters have retained our justices who were selected through a merit system and who have served the state so well," said Stephan, attorney general from 1979 to 1995. "This year, the courts are under attack with misleading accusations."

Six, who served as attorney general from 2008 to 2011, said Supreme Court justices in recent years had been the target of impeachment threats and a flurry of GOP-sponsored bills designed to draw power to the executive and legislative branches.

"It's a power grab to try to replace a well-functioning court with one that would bend to the will of the other branches of government," Six said. "Allow our justices to remain fair and impartial and make rulings based on the law, not on political opinions."

Six is a lawyer in private practice, specializing in business law, and Stephan said he retired several months ago.

No Supreme Court justice has been thrown off the bench through the process of statewide retention voting.

The seven current justices were among applicants vetted by a nominating commission that forwarded three names to a governor responsible for the final pick. If justices are ousted in November by simple majority votes, Brownback would be responsible for choosing from among finalists picked by the commission to fill vacancies.

For the first time, organizations with deep pockets are running campaigns for retention and ouster of justices.

A coalition of organizations that includes Kansans for Life and Kansans for Justice, affiliated with families of people killed in cases prompting death sentences, have been working to remove justices. Neither of these groups, aligned with Brownback, could be reached for comment. They are attempting to convince voters to retain Stegall, the governor's appointee, and vote out the four others appointed by Republican and Democrats before Brownback took office.

"It's pretty frustrating to pass pro-life laws and not see them enforced," said Mary Kay Culp, executive director of Kansans for Life.

Six and Stephan lauded work of the five justices and specifically paid tribute to the judicial contributions of Stegall.

"He has a great reputation," Stephan said. "His opinions are well thought out. The other members of the court respect him. I don't think it's an issue, because we have a fair and impartial system."

Kansans for Fair Courts, which hosted the news conference with Stephan and Six at the Kansas Judicial Center in Topeka, is leading the effort to retain the justices. The advocacy organization does not differentiate among members of the court up for retention votes and seeks to keep all on the bench.

"We are blessed in Kansas," Stephan said in regards to professionalism of justices on the Supreme Court. "I don't agree with them all the time, but that doesn't have anything to do with whether you're being fair."

He didn't mention the 2006 experience of Nuss, who was formally admonished by the Commission on Judicial Qualifications for violating three provisions of the state's judicial code of conduct. He was disciplined for meeting privately with two state senators and talking to them about issues related to a school-finance lawsuit pending before the court.

Six said routine ouster of Supreme Court justices based on political whim would deter the brightest lawyers from applying for vacancies.

"If you're going in for heart surgery, you don't want to throw the operating team with decades of experience out in favor of some new folks grabbed and put into office. This is a tested, seasoned and well-educated court that gets it right almost all the time," Six said.