A divided Wisconsin Supreme Court has rejected the Green Party’s request to place presidential candidate Howie Hawkins on the state’s slate, giving local clerks the go-ahead to begin sending out absentee ballots to voters.
Tag Archives: Wisconsin Supreme Court
Liberal Wisconsin Supreme Court Restricts Ballot Access
Strike three for Hagedorn. Wisconsin’s high court has turned.
The 4-3 decision — which had conservative Justice Brian Hagedorn joining the court’s three liberals to form a majority — found it was too late for Hawkins to be added, citing the “very short deadlines” and “the fact that the 2020 fall general election has essentially begun.”
“It is too late to grant petitioners any form of relief that would be feasible and that would not cause confusion and undue damage to both the Wisconsin electors who want to vote and the other candidates in all of the various races on the general election ballot,” wrote the majority.
Posted by Owen at 2141 hours
Wisconsin Supreme Court Halts Issuance of Absentee Ballots
This election is going to be a complete mess.
MADISON – The state Supreme Court told election officials Thursday that absentee ballots should not be mailed for now so the justices can determine whether they should include the Green Party’s presidential ticket.
The 4-3 order left open the possibility of reprinting 2.3 million ballots and delaying the printing of others — moves that election officials said would cause them to miss deadlines set by state law.
The order fell along ideological lines, with the conservatives in the majority and the liberals in dissent.
In response to the order, the state Elections Commission submitted a report late Thursday that suggested as many as 378,000 ballots have already been sent to voters. But the head of the commission said there was no way to know for certain how many ballots have been sent because that duty falls to municipal clerks, not the commission.
Adding candidates to the ballots after some have been sent would be complicated. Voters who have already been sent a ballot would need to get a second one and clerks would have to make sure no one voted twice.
[…]
The Green Party case centers on whether presidential nominee Howie Hawkins and vice presidential nominee Angela Walker should be on the ballot.
The Elections Commission didn’t include the Green Party on the ballot after it deadlocked last month on the issue. Walker, a Milwaukee native, provided two different addresses on her campaign filings, and the three Democrats on the commission said that should keep the Green Party off the ballot. The commission’s three Republicans wanted the Green Party on the ballot.
Unspoken at last month’s commission meeting was how the Green Party could affect the presidential election. Democrats fear the liberal party could take votes away from Democratic nominee Joe Biden and Republicans hope such a situation will help GOP President Donald Trump.
Posted by Owen at 1929 hours
Court Upholds Law
I must say, AP reporter Scott Bauer has gotten worse and worse. He doesn’t even attempt to write an unbiased story. Check out the overtly loaded language. But as for the story itself, good.
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The conservative-controlled Wisconsin Supreme Court on Thursday upheld Republican-authored lame-duck laws that stripped power from the incoming Democratic attorney general just before he took office in 2019.
The justices rejected arguments that the laws were unconstitutional, handing another win to Republicans who have scored multiple high-profile victories before the court in recent years.
The 5-2 ruling marks the second time that the court has upheld the lame-duck laws passed in December 2018, just weeks before Gov. Tony Evers and Attorney General Josh Kaul, both Democrats, took office. The actions in Wisconsin mirrored Republican moves after losing control of the governors’ offices in Michigan in November 2018 and in North Carolina in 2016. Democrats decried the tactics as brazen attempts to hold onto power after losing elections.
[…]
Thursday’s ruling involved a case filed by a coalition of labor unions led by the State Employees International Union. The coalition argued that the laws give the Legislature power over the attorney general’s office and that this violates the separation of powers doctrine in the state constitution.
The laws prohibit Evers from ordering Kaul to withdraw from lawsuits, let legislators intervene in lawsuits using their own attorneys rather than Kaul’s state Department of Justice lawyers, and force Kaul to get permission from the Legislature’s Republican-controlled budget committee before settling lawsuits.
Republicans designed the laws to prohibit Evers from pulling Wisconsin out of a multistate lawsuit challenging the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, and to ensure that they have a say in court if Kaul chooses not to defend GOP-authored laws.
Posted by Owen at 1253 hours
Wisconsin’s Constitutional Problem
This is the heart of the problem with Governor Evers’ power grab.
“There is a constitutional problem with the Legislature giving away this much power to an unelected cabinet secretary,” Bradley said. “The people never consented to a single individual having that much power.”
Whether or not you think the order is a good idea or not, Americans have purposefully divided power in their government to prevent the concentration of power.
Think about how this power could be abused (if you don’t think it’s being abused already). Imagine that they declare smoking a health crisis and the Health Secretary orders anyone caught smoking (tobacco or Mary Jane) or vaping to be imprisoned. Or perhaps too much screen time is declared a health emergency so the government regulates your screen time from the ISP. Or having large groups of kids together spreads disease so a bureaucrat closes all public schools. I’m struggling to come up with a farcical example because I could see any of these things being done if we concentrate that much power in the hands of a few… or one.
We are a self-governing people and our Constitution was constructed precisely to prevent something like this. Separate, coequal powers; checks and balances; elected officials making laws; Rule of Law; etc… these are the roots to which we must return.
Posted by Owen at 0657 hours
Supreme Court Takes Case. Will Hold Hearings on Tuesday.
Ugh.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court on Friday said it would take up a controversial case that could result in the suspension of Gov. Tony Evers’ stay-at-home order, implemented to mitigate the spread of COVID-19.
The 6-1 decision is a setback for the Evers administration, which wanted the court to throw it out. Now, attorneys for the administration and Republican Legislature, which brought the lawsuit, will present their arguments via videoconferencing on Tuesday, after which the court could rule.
It frustrates the hell out of me that the court moves so slow. For most of the court’s business, time is not of the essence. They are deciding on some legal issue about an incident that is long over and the immediate impact of that decision impacts very few. But when there is something going on RIGHT NOW that requires a decision, the people deserve for them to act faster.
In this case, we have a rogue executive branch that is seizing dictatorial powers to usurp the power of the legislature and rule by decree. The governor is violating every Wisconsinite’s civil rights and causing incredible irreparable harm to the economy and lives of millions of citizens. If there was ever a time that required swift action by the court to restore the division of powers and uphold the people’s rights, this is it.
The court showed that they can at swiftly when required. Just a few weeks ago, they acted within hours of Evers’ unconstitutional attempt to move the election. Why can’t they do that here? That’s the wrong question. They can do it here. Why are they choosing to plod along?
Posted by Owen at 0649 hours
Wisconsin Supreme Court Thwarts Evers’ Unconstitutional Power Grab
Good.
MADISON – The Wisconsin Supreme Court reinstated Tuesday’s election Monday, five hours after Democratic Gov. Tony Evers called it off because of the widening coronavirus pandemic.
In a brief 4-2 ruling, the court undid an emergency order that Evers issued that would have closed the polls. Their decision came in response to a lawsuit filed by Republican lawmakers.
Monday’s on-again, off-again election triggered chaos across the state as election officials told clerks to continue preparing for an election because they did not know whether the polls would open.
Before the court acted, at least two local government leaders as of Monday afternoon issued their own orders to block in-person voting.
The high court’s ruling fell along ideological lines. Four conservatives — Chief Justice Patience Roggensack and Justices Rebecca Bradley, Brian Hagedorn and Annette Ziegler — were in the majority. Liberal Justices Ann Walsh Bradley and Rebecca Dallet were in dissent.
What should worry you is that despite the fact that, by Evers’ own admission, it was very clear that Evers was usurping power, the two liberal justices used their power to try to ignore the constitution and the law in favor of influencing a political outcome. That is why we need to make sure that Dan Kelly remains on the court to protect the people from judicial rule.
Posted by Owen at 1735 hours
Kelly and Karofsky Advance
The results exactly reflects where Wisconsin is… divided electorate, Dane County liberal turnout balanced against WOW Counties conservative turnout. Turnout for the general election should be much larger, but the patter remains.
Incumbent Supreme Court Justice Daniel Kelly and Dane County Circuit Court Judge Jill Karofsky will advance to the April 7 election to compete for a 10-year term on the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
Kelly and Karofsky, both judges, were the top two vote-getters in Tuesday’s statewide primary, besting Marquette Law School professor Ed Fallone by significant margins. The results pit Kelly, the conservative-backed incumbent who has served on the court since 2016, against a Dane County local, backed by liberals, who was first elected as a circuit court judge in 2017.
With 97% of the precincts in, Kelly, of North Prairie, got the most votes, at about 50%, while Karofsky finished second, with 37%. Fallone was a distant third, at 13% support.
Posted by Owen at 0954 hours
Supreme Court Affirms Constitution
Two thoughts… first, it’s hard to get excited over something that should be obvious to all. Second, it’s a travesty of justice that this was not a unanimous ruling. It just shows how hardcore partisan the liberals on the court have become and why the voters need to continue to correct for their bias.
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Wisconsin’s conservative-controlled Supreme Court on Friday upheld lame-duck laws limiting the powers of Democratic Gov. Tony Evers and Attorney General Josh Kaul, handing Republican lawmakers a resounding victory.
The win was on procedural grounds only and the ruling isn’t the end of the legal challenges. Two other challenges to the laws themselves and not the process used to pass them are pending. One of those is in federal court, a move that Democrats hope gives them a better shot at sidestepping conservative judges.
Most of the laws — enacted just weeks before Republican Gov. Scott Walker left office after his November defeat — have been reinstated and are in effect while the legal challenges proceed.
A group of liberal-leaning organizations led by the League of Women Voters sued in January alleging the laws are invalid because legislators convened illegally to pass them in December. The groups maintained the Legislature’s session had ended months earlier and that the lame-duck floor session wasn’t part of the Legislature’s regular schedule.
Posted by Owen at 0921 hours
Supreme Court Takes Up Challenges to Legislation
Good. And for the last time, there was nothing “lame-duck” about those laws.
MADISON – The state Supreme Court agreed Monday to quickly take up a lawsuit challenging lame-duck laws aimed at curbing the power of the state’s top Democrats.
The high court unanimously accepted the case before an appeals court finishes its work on the lawsuit, speeding up its final resolution.
The justices put the case on a fast track, agreeing to hear arguments May 15.
Other lawsuits are pending — one in state court and one in federal court — so the Supreme Court’s ruling in this case likely won’t be the last word on whether the lame-duck laws are valid.
Posted by Owen at 2151 hours
Neubauer Concedes
I’m glad that cooler heads prevailed and she will not put the state through the turmoil of a fruitless recount.
State Appeals Court Judge Lisa Neubauer on Wednesday conceded a race for a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court to her colleague Brian Hagedorn.
The concession comes more than a week after an election during which Neubauer trailed Hagedorn by about 6,000 votes and concludes a bitter competition for the 10-year term.
“I love being a judge. I treasure our state, our judiciary and its role in our democracy but this race was never about me. It was really about the integrity and the independence of our courts,” Neubauer said in an interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “We knew it was going to be close. We laid it all out there. We put everything we had into this race.”
[…]
But outside spending throughout the race favored Neubauer.
It is worth noting that Neubauer is up for reelection to the Appeals Court next April and she lost every county in that court’s jurisdiction. Some good conservative lawyer or judge should go for it.
Posted by Owen at 0911 hours
Hagedorn Wins Supreme Court Race
Huzzah, huzzah. It is great to see the voters of Wisconsin push back on anti-religious bigotry and elect a great, constructionist jurist to the highest court.
Conservative Brian Hagedorn, who was Walker’s chief legal counsel for five years, led liberal-backed Lisa Neubauer by 5,911 votes out of 1.2 million cast, based on unofficial results. That is a difference of about 0.49 percentage point, close enough for Neubauer to request a recount but she would have to pay for it.
Hagedorn declared victory early Wednesday morning.
“The people of Wisconsin have spoken, and our margin of victory is insurmountable,” he said in a statement.
Minutes after he declared victory, the Neubauer campaign sent out a fundraising plea saying “with the vote total neck and neck, it looks like we’re heading into a potential recount.” Her campaign adviser Scott Spector said Wednesday morning that Hagedorn’s declaration of victory did not change their position that a recount was likely.
Posted by Owen at 0714 hours
The thumb on the scales
Here is my full column from the Washington County Daily News
If there was any doubt as to the importance of the upcoming Wisconsin Supreme Court election, the outrageous ruling by rogue Dane County Circuit Judge Richard Niess should vanquish it. The leftists have shown that they are willing to use the power of the judicial branch to advance their radical agenda without scruples or remorse. Against such an onslaught, a Supreme Court comprised of strict constitutionalists serves as the last bastion against the judicial usurpation of our representative government.
In the waning days of the last legislative session, the Legislature passed a series of laws to shore up their gains of the previous eight years before the Democrats assumed control of the executive branch. In a clear violation of the separation of powers principle and a gross overreach of judicial authority, a single, lowly Dane County judge ruled that the entire extraordinary season was unconstitutional, and thus, all of the laws duly passed during the session are unconstitutional. In his ruling, Judge Niess ignored the clear wording of the Constitution, the statutes, and decades of legislative practice by both major political parties. Judge Niess’ ruling was not based on law. It was based on advancing a liberal political outcome.
If you wondered what that outcome was, Democrats Gov. Tony Evers and Attorney General Josh Kaul quickly confirmed it as they moved swiftly after the ruling to withdraw the state from the federal Obamacare lawsuit and begin the process of replacing the 82 people appointed by Gov. Scott Walker who were confirmed in that session.
The ruling is such an egregious overreach that if it holds, it would invalidate hundreds of laws passed over the past several decades. The Legislature has been meeting in extraordinary seasons for years, as is their prerogative, to pass legislation. The most recent extraordinary session was to listen to Governor Evers’ budget address. But before that, taxpayer funding for Fiserv Forum, redistricting, campaign finance laws, government funding laws, and much more have been passed in extraordinary sessions.
In all, the Legislature has held over two dozen extraordinary sessions over the previous two generations for the purpose of passing laws supported by both Democrats and Republicans. If extraordinary sessions are themselves unconstitutional, as Judge Niess’ preposterous partisan ruling states, then all of those laws would be unconstitutional.
Thankfully, Dane County Judge Niess’ ruling will likely be stayed by an appeals court this week before being completely overturned. If Dane County voters have any fidelity to the rule of law, Niess will be run off the bench for his blatant abuse of power. He is a disgrace.
The judicial system is designed to correct for rogue and incompetent judges by allowing bad decisions to be appealed through multiple higher courts. But if the same rabid partisanship that infects Judge Niess is permitted to spread to the Supreme Court, the Legislature and governor will be relegated to merely being entertaining political theater because the austere tyrants in black robes will make all of the real decisions.
Judge Niess, Governor Evers, and Attorney General Kaul tipped their hands to how they will neuter the power of the Republican-led Legislature if the radical leftists take control of the state Supreme Court. They will follow the path of the leftist horde after Governor Walker was elected. They will get a fellow traveler on the Dane County bench to rule laws they do not like as unconstitutional, and then act by judicial and executive fiat. Except this time, instead of the Supreme Court overturning bad rulings and showing deference to the Constitution and the tenets of representative government, a leftist-dominated court will set the leftist agenda into stone.
On April 2, or anytime this week via early voting, it is critically important that Wisconsin elect Judge Brian Hagedorn to the Wisconsin Supreme Court. He has demonstrated the appropriate humility, firm adherence to the Constitution, and deference to representative government necessary to protect the individual rights of Wisconsinites. If the Supreme Court is to remain a bulwark for individual liberty and representative government, we need to elect justices like Brian Hagedorn who believe in those principles.
Posted by Owen at 0610 hours
The thumb on the scales
My column for the Washington County Daily News is in print and on line. Here’re the highlights, but be sure to pick up a copy to read the whole thing!
If there was any doubt as to the importance of the upcoming Wisconsin Supreme Court election, the outrageous ruling by rogue Dane County Circuit Judge Richard Niess should vanquish it. The leftists have shown that they are willing to use the power of the judicial branch to advance their radical agenda without scruples or remorse. Against such an onslaught, a Supreme Court comprised of strict constitutionalists serves as the last bastion against the judicial usurpation of our representative government.
[…]
Judge Niess’ ruling was not based on law. It was based on advancing a liberal political outcome.
If you wondered what that outcome was, DemocratsGov. Tony Evers and Attorney General Josh Kaul quickly confirmed it as they moved swiftly after the ruling to withdraw the state from the federal Obamacare lawsuit and begin the process of replacing the 82 people appointed by Gov. Scott Walker who were confirmed in that session.
[…]
Thankfully, Dane County Judge Niess’ ruling will likely be stayed by an appeals court this week before being completely overturned. If Dane County voters have any fidelity to the rule of law, Niess will be run off the bench for his blatant abuse of power. He is a disgrace.
The judicial system is designed to correct for rogue and incompetent judges by allowing bad decisions to be appealed through multiple higher courts. But if the same rabid partisanship that infects Judge Niess is permitted to spread to the Supreme Court, the Legislature and governor will be relegated to merely being entertaining political theater because the austere tyrants in black robes will make all of the real decisions.
Judge Niess, Governor Evers, and Attorney General Kaul tipped their hands to how they will neuter the power of the Republican-led Legislature if the radical leftists take control of the state Supreme Court. They will follow the path of the leftist horde after Governor Walker was elected. They will get a fellow traveler on the Dane County bench to rule laws they do not like as unconstitutional, and then act by judicial and executive fiat. Except this time, instead of the Supreme Court overturning bad rulings and showing deference to the Constitution and the tenets of representative government, a leftist-dominated court will set the leftist agenda into stone.
On April 2, or anytime this week via early voting, it is critically important that Wisconsin elect Judge Brian Hagedorn to the Wisconsin Supreme Court. He has demonstrated the appropriate humility, firm adherence to the Constitution, and deference to representative government necessary to protect the individual rights of Wisconsinites. If the Supreme Court is to remain a bulwark for individual liberty and representative government, we need to elect justices like Brian Hagedorn who believe in those principles.
Posted by Owen at 0645 hours
Elect Hagedorn to protect Wisconsin’s conservative revolution
Here is my full column that ran yesterday in the Washington County Daily News.
Wisconsin’s era of conservative reform came to an end with the election of Gov. Tony Evers. With a liberal governor, the conservative majorities in the Legislature are relegated to a rearguard action to defend the magnificent gains made in the last eight years. But the Legislature’s rampart might be flanked if Wisconsin’s liberals are able to seize control of Wisconsin’s Supreme Court. They could do that next year unless Judge Brian Hagedorn is elected to the court this April.
When Scott Walker was elected in 2010, Wisconsin’s liberals made it clear that they could not abide the will of the people and allow conservatives to govern. A familiar pattern emerged: Republicans legally pass conservative legislation into law; liberals sue; Dane County judge invalidates conservative law; after appeals, the Wisconsin Supreme Court overturns the Dane County judge and allows the law to take hold. The Wisconsin Supreme Court has consistently thwarted the liberals’ attempt to overturn conservative laws through the courts, so the liberals are determined to get the court back under their control.
Right now, four of Wisconsin’s Supreme Court Justices are judicial conservatives. That means that they think the role of the court is to strictly interpret the law as written and respect the rights and responsibilities of the other two branches of government to enact the will of the people through legislation. By contrast, three of Wisconsin’s Supreme Court justices are judicial liberals, meaning that they take a more expansive view of the role of the court to enact their own wills to right wrongs, as they define them, with little regard for judicial restraint.
One of those three judicial liberals, Justice Shirley Abrahamson, is retiring and the election this April is to replace her. At first glance, this may appear to be a relatively inconsequential election. The balance of the court is not on the line. If the people of Wisconsin elect a judicial liberal, the balance of the court will remain the same. If the voters elect a judicial conservative, then the judicial conservatives strengthen their majority to a 5-2 split. Without much on the line, why worry, right?
The key is to look to April of 2020. In that election, incumbent Justice Dan Kelly will likely run for reelection. Kelly is one of the judicial conservatives on the court. The challenge for Kelly is that the presidential primary will be on the same ballot. President Donald Trump is unlikely to face a serious primary challenger, so Republican turnout will be light. Meanwhile, the Democratic primary for president portends to be hotly contested, so Democratic turnout will likely be massive. That does not bode well for a conservative judicial candidate on the ballot. Kelly faces a steep uphill climb that has nothing to do with him, and everything to do with the rest of the ballot.
If Wisconsin’s voters replace Abrahamson with another judicial liberal and retain a 4-3 judicial conservative majority, it is exceedingly likely that the election of April 2020 will flip the court to a judicial liberal majority. If that happens, liberals will sue to overturn every conservative law passed in the previous decade and have the Supreme Court on their side. They cannot turn back the clock through the representative democratic process, so they will turn to the courts instead. Act 10, concealed carry, school choice, the repeal of prevailing wage, the Wisconsin REINS Act, voter ID, right to work, castle doctrine — all of it is at risk if judicial liberals gain control of Wisconsin’s Supreme Court.
That is why Wisconsin must elect a judicial conservative to the Supreme Court this April. That judicial conservative is Appeals Court Judge Brian Hagedorn.
Hagedorn has served in a number of legal capacities since graduating from the Northwestern University School of Law. After three years in private practice, he worked as a law clerk for Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman before going to work as an assistant attorney general. He worked as Gov. Scott Walker’s chief legal counsel from 2011 to 2015 during the time when many of Wisconsin’s most significant reforms in generations were passed into law. Since 2015, Hagedorn has been serving as a judge on Wisconsin’s Court of Appeals.
Hagedorn’s judicial philosophy is one of restraint and humble respect for the individual rights and the will of the people. As he says, “justices wear neutral robes, not capes.” That is exactly the kind of attitude Wisconsin needs on the court to protect our liberties and uphold constitutional laws that were dutifully passed by the representatives of the people.
Posted by Owen at 0646 hours
Elect Hagedorn to protect Wisconsin’s conservative revolution
My column for the Washington County Daily News is online and in print. Log on or pick up a copy for the whole thing. Here’s a sample:
The key is to look to April of 2020. In that election, incumbent Justice Dan Kelly will likely run for reelection. Kelly is one of the judicial conservatives on the court.The challenge for Kelly is that the presidential primary will be on the same ballot. President Donald Trump is unlikely to face a serious primary challenger, so Republican turnout will be light. Meanwhile, the Democratic primary for president portends to be hotly contested, so Democratic turnout will likely be massive. That does not bode well for a conservative judicial candidate on the ballot. Kelly faces a steep uphill climb that has nothing to do with him, and everything to do with the rest of the ballot.
If Wisconsin’s voters replace Abrahamson with another judicial liberal and retain a 4-3 judicial conservative majority, it is exceedingly likely that the election of April 2020 will flip the court to a judicial liberal majority. If that happens, liberals will sue to overturn every conservative law passed in the previous decade and have the Supreme Court on their side. They cannot turn back the clock through the representative democratic process, so they will turn to the courts instead. Act 10, concealed carry, school choice, the repeal of prevailing wage, the Wisconsin REINS Act, voter ID, right to work, castle doctrine — all of it is at risk if judicial liberals gain control of Wisconsin’s Supreme Court.
That is why Wisconsin must elect a judicial conservative to the Supreme Court this April. That judicial conservative is Appeals Court Judge Brian Hagedorn.
Posted by Owen at 0904 hours
Screnock and Dallet Move to the General Election
Sauk County Circuit Judge Michael Screnock and Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Rebecca Dallet advanced out of Tuesday’s primary for the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
[…]
Screnock piled up huge advantages in Waukesha, Washington and Ozaukee counties and also won handily in Kenosha and Jefferson counties. With most of the ballots counted, he had 46% of the vote.
In Milwaukee County, Dallet won over Screnock while Burns trailed badly. Dallet also overwhelmed Burns in his home of Dane County. Statewide, Dallet had 36% to Burns’ 18%.
Good job, Wisconsin. And this election hints that the forecasted Blue Wave may be overstated.
Posted by Owen at 2331 hours
Vote Tomorrow
Tomorrow is election day in Wisconsin!
There are a number of local primaries and referenda on the ballot, but the only statewide race is the primary for the Supreme Court. There are three candidates on the ballot and the top two will move on to the general election. As I wrote a few weeks ago, it’s an easy choice. Judge Scroneck is the only conservative on the ballot, but there’s a real chance he could lose in a low turnout election. GET OUT AND VOTE!
In West Bend, we also have an unnecessary primary for the West Bend School Board. There are two seats up for that board. Originally, five candidates put their hats in the ring, which forces a primary to narrow the field to four candidates. Since then, one of the candidates dropped out, so there are only four viable candidates (no, I don’t know what happens if the candidate who dropped out wins enough votes to go on). Since the primary didn’t mean anything, I haven’t taken the time to speak with the candidates. I’ll do so before the general election and share my thoughts.
Posted by Owen at 2253 hours
Supreme Court Rules on Open Records
This looks like a good balance.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court, deciding along ideological lines, said Tuesday that a state agency that oversees public employee union recertification elections can delay the release of voter records to prevent voter intimidation.
Government openness advocates warned that the ruling could have a broad impact on the public’s right to know how its government works because it allows records custodians to consider the perceived motivations of requesters when determining whether to release records.
The court’s 5-2 decision overturns a ruling in Dane County Circuit Court that favored Madison Teachers Inc.
MTI sued the Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission, which in 2015 denied MTI’s requests for lists of teachers who did and did not vote in the annual union recertification election. MTI had sought the records under the state’s open records law, but WERC denied the release of the records during the election because it feared that MTI would use that information to intimidate voters who had not yet voted.[…]
Roggensack wrote that WERC Commissioner James Scott properly balanced the considerations of the state’s open records law with concerns about voter intimidation before deciding not to release voter records during the election.
“Preventing voter intimidation during elections conducted by phone and email, as occurred here, is challenging,” Roggensack wrote. “Given MTI’s repeated requests for the names of those who voted before the election concluded, it is entirely possible that those employees who had not yet voted would become subject to individualized pressure by MTI of a type that MTI could not exert when speaking to all members of the bargaining unit collectively.”
These records are public and should be released, but there is good reason to not release them as an election is in process. This is especially true when it comes to groups that have a history of using intimidation tactics.
Posted by Owen at 1703 hours
Easy choice for Wisconsin Supreme Court
My column for the Washington County Daily News is online. Here you go:
The passage of time makes it easy to forget how activist and liberal the Wisconsin Supreme Court was a few short years ago. For many years before 2008, the liberal majority on the Wisconsin Supreme Court rendered ruling after ruling that eviscerated individual liberty, punished commerce and rewrote laws from the bench.
By 2007, Wisconsin voters had had enough. Wisconsinites elected conservative Justice Annette Ziegler to an open seat, but the liberals on the court still held a 4-3 majority. 2008 was the pivotal year. In that year, the upstart judicial conservative Michael Gableman challenged incumbent liberal Justice Louis Butler and won. This was the first time since 1967 that an incumbent Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice had lost a bid for reelection. Gableman’s victory also flipped the court to a conservative majority. Since 2008, Wisconsin voters have elected or reelected judicial conservatives every time except once. Conservatives hold a 5-2 majority on the court.
The conservative majority on the Wisconsin Supreme Court has been critical in Wisconsin’s conservative reformation. Liberals who failed to win elections and majorities in the legislative or executive branches have routinely run to the courts to advance their agenda. Act 10, right to work, concealed carry, school choice, regulatory reforms, tort reforms, welfare reforms, etc. would all likely have been thwarted by a liberal Supreme Court.
After serving for 10 years, Gableman has chosen to return to private life, thus inviting an open election for the seat. There are three candidates for the seat. On Feb. 20, Wisconsinites will go to the polls to narrow the field to two candidates in the spring primary election. With one judicial conservative, one judicial liberal and one activist liberal, the choice could not be clearer.
Tim Burns is a liberal Madison lawyer who has made his name suing insurance companies. Although the Supreme Court race is nonpartisan, Burns is taking the approach of running as an avowed “progressive” (the chosen moniker of modern socialists) and is unabashed about espousing his political opinions. He also believes that the court should not just interpret laws passed by the other two branches of government, but that the court should intervene to “protect the middle-class economy.” Burns also believes that the court has an “obligation to strive for more than just equality. Progressive courts can ensure equity.”
Burns does not want to just interpret and enforce the laws as written. He wants the Supreme Court to serve as a socialist super-legislature that will reshape our lives in his vision — win Tim Burns making the decisions, of course. Burns is not just the typical judicial liberal. He is a dangerous activist with little regard for representative government or judicial restraint.
Rebecca Dallet is a more traditional judicial liberal. Dallet has been a Milwaukee County Circuit Court judge for 10 years after working as an assistance district attorney for Milwaukee County. She is president of the Milwaukee Trial Judges Association and secretary of the Association of Women Lawyers. While Dallet is also an avowed liberal, she advocates a more restrained approach to the bench than Burns.
Dallet’s judicial rulings reveal her liberal approach to justice. As recently uncovered by Right Wisconsin, Dallet sentenced a confessed pedophile to a mere two years in jail saying, “there wasn’t an extreme amount of harm. There wasn’t intercourse” as if a grown man repeatedly fondling the vaginal areas of two elementary school children was not serious enough to warrant a more severe penalty.
Dallet has been at the heart of the liberal criminal justice system in Milwaukee County that has enabled violence and crime to surge. If voters want the rest of Wisconsin to look more like Milwaukee County, then a vote for Dallet would be the way to go.
The third candidate is the only judicial conservative in the race. Judge Michael Screnock has served as a Sauk County Circuit Court judge since 2015, but he has a very well-rounded background with experience in education, the private sector, local government and the legal system. After earning a BS in mathematics from UW-Madison and an MBA with an emphasis in urban economic development, Screnock worked for the cities of Reedsburg, Washburn and Ashland before returning to UW-Madison to earn a law degree. Screnock then worked for Michael Best & Fredrich for nearly 10 years before Gov, Walker appointed him to the Sauk County Circuit Court.
Screnock has a traditionally conservative judicial philosophy rooted in restraint and deference to the other branches of government. Screnock believes that “the role of a judge or justice is to interpret and apply the law, not rewrite the law.” While such a statement seems like traditional common sense, it stands in stark contrast to the judicial philosophies of Burns and Dallet.
Wisconsinites have worked very hard over the last decade to build a conservative Supreme Court majority that upholds the law with humble respect for the role of the court. That work must continue by electing Judge Screnock to the court — first on Feb. 20 and again on April 3.
Posted by Owen at 0712 hours
Wisconsin Supreme Court Rules on Open Meetings
Excellent! There seems to be a trend of school boards trying to do more and more in the dark. We need to be vigilant about pushing that trend back.
MADISON – The Wisconsin Supreme Court on Thursday ruled Appleton school officials violated the open meetings law when they reviewed a freshman reading class behind closed doors.
The unanimous decision by Justice Michael Gableman reversed two lower court rulings. The case now returns to Waupaca Circuit Court for further proceedings.
Posted by Owen at 0849 hours
