In mid-December, the State Judicial Nominating Commission began taking applications for three vacancies on the Iowa Supreme Court.

The Judicial Nominating Commission is made up of the Senior Justice on the Supreme Court, seven non-lawyer members appointed by the Governor, and seven lawyer members. Commission members are chosen without regard to political affiliation.

The Chief Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court, Mark S. Cady, delivered the annual State of the Judiciary address to the Legislature this week.

We are fortunate that Iowa has one of the best-rated and most respected judicial systems in the country. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and others point to Iowa’s impartial judicial system as an argument for investing in Iowa. Yet because of budget cuts, Cady said that “more and more Iowans faced with legal problems are forced to wait too long for their day in court.”

For our World AIDS Day 2010 section, we wanted to capture the diversity of the AIDS community. So, we reached out to people across the world -- mostly those who have never written for us before -- and asked them to guest blog. These columns are written by people who are living with HIV, have been affected by HIV, or work in the field.

Who would have guessed that Iowa, of all places, would be in the midst of transformational change in our nation's battle regarding equal rights? On April 3, 2009, when the Iowa Supreme Courts ruled in favor of gay marriage in our great state so many people rejoiced. I was among those who celebrated, took pictures of friends who were able to apply for a marriage license with their partners, and cried like a baby at weddings. The fact that our courts ruled the ban on gay marriage as unconstitutional meant victory not only for civil and LGBT rights, but also for my work at the AIDS Project of Central Iowa, an agency near and dear to my heart since 2001.

It was one of the more striking results from last week's elections: three Iowa Supreme Court justices who joined last year's pro-gay-marriage ruling were voted out of office. Opponents of gay marriage celebrated, confident that a miscarriage of justice had been corrected at the ballot box, but they were wrong. The removal of these three judges — all highly respected jurists, appointed by both Republican and Democratic governors — should send a shiver down the spine of anyone who cares about the American system of justice.

In Iowa, supreme court justices are nominated to the bench by the governor in a merit-based system, but the voters get a chance to decide whether to keep them on for their first term and later for any additional terms. In last week's election, voters opted to remove Chief Justice Marsha Ternus, David Baker and Michael Streit. Their ousters marked the first time that an Iowa Supreme Court justice had been removed since the system was put in place in 1962.

The ouster of three Iowa Supreme Court justices created a load of problems Wednesday for state court administrators who have to keep the state judiciary afloat.

Chief Justice Marsha Ternus and Justices Michael Streit and David Baker were booted from the bench Tuesday, largely for their part in the unanimous 2009 ruling that allowed same-sex couples to marry in Iowa.

It was the first time Iowa voters have not retained Supreme Court justices since 1962, when the merit selection and retention system for judges was adopted. When the justices' terms expire on Dec. 31, it will be the first time there have been multiple vacancies on the high court.