To truly follow the Constitution, we should replace every judge with a robot.
People fear AI judges will destroy the 'human' element of justice, but if you believe in originalism, humans are actually the problem. This paper argues that if the law should be interpreted exactly as the Founders wrote it, then an unbiased AI is the 'platonic ideal' of a judge. A machine doesn't have political leanings, personal moods, or modern biases that cloud the original text. It means that the more conservative you are about the law, the more you should be cheering for a judicial AI takeover to remove human error. If the goal is purely to follow the text, then a 'mere machine' is the only way to be truly fair.
"Mere Machines": Why Originalism Requires Robotic Judging
SSRN · 6366878
<p><span>In 1776, Thomas Jefferson stated that a judge should be a “mere machine.” This statement captures the founding generation’s conception of the judicial task. From Edward Coke to Montesquieu to William Blackstone to Alexander Hamilton to John Marshall, the founding era’s governing legal tradition taught that judges do no more than mechanically apply the law to reach a case’s correct answer. Judges <i>find</i> the law, the Founders consistently emphasized, they do not <i>choose</i> it.</sp