The U.S. Supreme Court is likely to return control over picking judges in New York State to the leadership of the Democratic and Republican parties, a move that would reverse two lower courts that decided the state’s system of judicial selection was a sham process.

During oral arguments yesterday, the questioning from the bench strongly suggested that the court would uphold New York’s practice of holding judicial nominating conventions at which the political parties select their nominees for the state’s basic trial court. A decision by the Supreme Court to preserve the conventions would undermine efforts afoot in Albany to change over to an appointive system or install primary elections for all state judgeships. New York is the only state to use a convention system, complete with elected party delegates, to nominate judicial candidates for the November ballot. The system has come under criticism from lawyers because the delegates generally nominate the candidate known to be the favorite of the top local Democratic or Republican official. For those officials, the nominating conventions remain a bastion of their influence. Both-Democratic and Republican associations have asked the Supreme Court to preserve the system.

The suit before the court yesterday was brought by a lower court judge from Brooklyn, Margarita Lopez Torres, who lacked the support of the local Democratic leadership needed to win the nomination. Her lawyers claim the system violates the rights of such challenger candidates, as well as the rights of voters to have a meaningful say.

Yesterday, the justices seemed to dismiss her argument as the sort of griping expected from a frustrated candidate. Justice Souter especially seemed critical of the arguments advanced by Judge Lopez Torres’s lawyer, Frederick Schwarz Jr.

Justice Souter questioned why the Constitution required anything more than to allow each candidate to “have a chance to influence the process.” Under New York’s system, any candidate could petition the local party boss directly for support or recruit enough independent-minded delegates to attend the convention, Justice Souter said. The argument against New York’s system, he seemed to say in exchange after exchange, was that the odds were against any party outsider, not that party outsiders were forbidden from participating.

“It’s a success argument that you are making, not an access argument,” Justice Souter told Mr. Schwarz.

“It’s a compete argument,” Mr. Schwarz responded. “The Constitution should be read to say that if the state passes laws that make it very hard for voters to band together or for insurgent candidates to compete than they have to justify it.”

Other justices pointed out that states had wide leeway in deciding how to select their judges. In New York’s case, the state delegated the authority largely to the political parties.

“If the party wants to do it by smoke-filled room, the state can say, you can’t do it by smoke-filled room,” Justice Scalia said. “But that’s not the issue here. The state and the party are in agreement.” The case has attracted friend of the court briefs from a wide range of organizations calling on the justices to uphold the lower court decisions and declare the system unconstitutional. The Washington Legal Foundation and the American Civil Liberties Union, as well as District Attorney Charles Hynes and Mayor Koch, have filed briefs supporting Judge Lopez Torres. But Justice Stevens dismissed them as inconsequential. “They’re all policy arguments about why this is a terrible statute,” he said. “They’re not necessarily constitutional arguments. And that’s a vast difference.”