And that, my friends, is supposed to somehow, some way count as what lawyers and judges refer to as "precedent." I kid you not.
Read (including the comments).
Amazing.
[Please visit the iT Butler/Gableman archive.]
February 3, 2008
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4 comments:
You're going to have to help me out here because I have no idea why you think that I said that Justice Butler being (naturally) fond of his work counts as precedent. What I said is that other courts generally cite a judge's work because they think it is persuasive or lends credibility to their own decision. It means something and so, I imagine, a judge would be happy to see his work cited by other courts.
This is in response to your suggestion that the fact that other courts have cited decisions of the Wisconsin Supreme Court is somehow insignificant because they can't "control" those courts decisions.
To reiterate, the salient point here appears to be eluding the author of the paper in question and his defenders.
What the point is not is whether Knapp has been mentioned here and there, or that criminal defense attorneys have put Knapp to the service of their arguments, or that Butler is justly fond of his labors.
I agree that these mentions mean something, but they do not mean what Suhr is trying to make them mean.
The point is that Suhr has presented these cases in support of his proposition that Butler's evil influence is permeating the judiciary.
If the objectionable portions of Knapp did not influence the referenced outcomes at all -- and there is certainly no facial evidence in the opinions themselves that they did -- then Suhr should not be offering them in support of his proposition.
That he did is a highly questionable exercise in manipulating the law in order to tar the reputation of Justice Butler for the purposes of a political campaign.
Amazing indeed. Many of us are from time to time placed in the position of having to defend the indefensible, but in my experience not many relish it quite this much.
The Ohio Supreme Court's citation of that Wisconsin case does indeed mean "something." It means that the Ohio court majority is saying, "We're not the only state supreme court to interpret our state's constitution in this manner." That's it. Period. Nothing more. Suhr's strong suggestion to the contrary is laughably disingenuous.
On the plus side, Mr. Suhr likely has a bright future with Liberty Counsel.
"I emailed a copy of the post [pointing to the 'research briefings'] to a number of people with an interest in the race, including a few Republican campaign consultants. I did not send it directly to Judge Gableman, in part because I do not have his email. I would not be surprised, however, if a copy found its way into his hands. After all, one would expect that a candidate in a race would know what is going on in the race." - Daniel Suhr 2/3/08
Is it any wonder that every handwaving trick in the book is being employed to dismiss the critics? Admitting error may have drastic consequences at this point.
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