Enemies of an independent judiciary in Missouri are at it again. Measures have been filed in the Missouri House and Senate seeking to gut the state’s non-partisan judicial appointment process and render it little more than a political sham.

The state’s current system — the so-called Missouri Plan approved in 1940 — is celebrated and emulated nationally. Nominating commissions of citizens, practicing lawyers and an appellate court judge review applications of candidates for seats on the state’s appellate courts and for trial judge positions in metropolitan areas. The committees choose panels of three candidates, from which the governor appoints one to fill the vacancy.

This year’s legislative initiative is much like one defeated last year. It would stack nominating committees with gubernatorial appointees and subject them to partisan tests in the state Senate. Merit selection further would be diluted by requirements that the governor receive panels of five candidates rather than three.

The governor could reject all of them and demand another panel of five, in hopes that at least one candidate would be more ideologically appealing.

The legislative resolutions, which, if approved, would go before voters for approval, are sponsored by lawmakers who have made careers by trying to undermine the judicial system. Among them are state Sens. Jim Lembke, R-Lemay, and Jane Cunningham, R-Chesterfield.

Mr. Lembke is infamous for his single-minded effort as a House member last year to dismantle the non-partisan judicial appointment plan. He also crusaded to end the career of a judge who had the temerity to rule against friends of a former GOP state senator in a child custody matter.

Also as a House member, Ms. Cunningham tried to strip the courts of the power to rule on the constitutionality of legislation. She sponsored legislation that would have prohibited judges from ruling on matters related to taxes.

What’s different this time is how supporters of the measure have revealed their true motives — are about manipulating, not reforming. the judicial system.

The Federalist Society, a national organization of conservative lawyers, long has attempted to undermine Missouri’s system of appointing judges. Leonard Leo, a senior Federalist Society official, for example, called former Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt “a coward” because, in 2007, he appointed Patricia Breckenridge, a widely respected jurist with a moderate judicial philosophy, to the state Supreme Court. She was one of three candidates, and the only Republican, on the panel submitted to Mr. Blunt by the nominating commission.

Now the Federalist Society’s national public relations firm — the same firm that promoted Swiftboat Veterans for Truth — is beating the drum for the current effort to undermine the Missouri Plan. Last week, the firm was touting a recent Missouri Supreme Court decision that turned back a challenge to pro-business amendments to the state’s worker compensation system.

The amendments make it considerably more difficult for workers to be compensated for workplace injuries. It short, it’s the kind of decision the pro-business Federalist Society loves.

The news release coyly notes how “some . . .speculate that the outcome is a result of the attention (the) Missouri Plan debate has drawn to the Supreme Court.”

Thus are the motives of the reformers revealed: If you threaten and batter judges and degrade the system with bogus reforms, you might just scare courts into ruling your way.