No other state gives legislators more power in selecting judges than Virginia, where a judge’s appointment or reappointment hinges on legislative favor. At some levels of court, there are no institutional buffers between judicial candidates and the legislators who elect them, raising questions about how insulated judges are from the political process.

Virginia’s method of judicial selection, more than 130 years old, has generated few large-scale scandals, but nonetheless has fueled questions about the appearance of judicial independence. Among other concerns, it has given rise to a system in which a single lawmaker wields the authority to unseat a judge, and where judges’ ties to legislators are a common denominator in who winds up on the bench.

These stories, and others to follow, trace the influence of politics in Virginia’s judiciary system, throwing light on the selection process and the judges it produces.