SCOWI oral argument preview: Mike Gableman is "tireless, indefatigable and brilliant." — Justice David Prosser 04/18/11In re: 2011AP000765-W and 2011AP000613-LV
This morning's line-up:
State ex rel Mike Huebsch: 50 minutes (Maria Lazar [?])The festivities commence at 9:45 a.m., Central Standard Time.
Dane County Circuit Court: 15 minutes (Dean Strang)
Dane County District Atty: 15 minutes (Ismail Ozanne)
State Rep. Peter Barca (D): 10 minutes (Bob Jambois*)
State Sen. Mark Miller (D): 10 minutes (Lester Pines)
Sec. of State Doug La Follette: 10 minutes (Roger Sage)
Huebsch rebuttal: 10 minutes [Misc. DOJ]
Now maybe the Wisconsin Department of Justice will explain how and why Wisconsin's Open Meetings Law is unconstitutional, complete with citations to relevant 17th century English parliamentary common law.
Livetweeting (hopefully).
* Jambois should feature among the highlights.
eta 01: Deputy AG Kevin St. John appeared for State ex rel Huebsch and Dean Strang's law firm colleague Marie Stanton appeared for the Dane County Circuit Court (Judge Sumi). Those are all the attorneys the court heard from by 12:10 p.m. before adjourning for lunch until 1:30, so that's only two lawyers down and five to go. Gonna be a looong day.
Hard to say where things are going to shake out at this point but — and, real superficial observation here — the court's so-called conservatives appear to be more inclined to sympathize with the DOJ's demand for what is essentially judicial activism and legislating from the bench.
eta 02: "17th century English parliamentary common law." Think I was joking eh? St. John actually invoked it, without being prompted. It's supposed to override the laws of Wisconsin. This is how the DOJ argues.
Res ipsa loquitur.
7 comments:
Thanks for the live tweeting!
They don't seem to be wrestling much with the core issue of whether the writ is moot.
Tireless and indefatigable? That's a great combo!
Because tireless and easily fatigued is nowhere near as good.
The so-called conservative judges are inclined to be judicial activists, what a shock. Prosser thinks he's out of the woods, but you know, he's not. I wouldn't be surprised to see these guys invalidate the Walker recall on some pretext, Bush-v-Gore style. At that point we would have no alternative but to recall these justices. That would actually be something to look forward to.
why not circulate those petitions when you circulate the walker petitions? seems like it would be more efficient...
Yes! If we're going to the effort of recalling Walker, why not take Gableman out at the same time.
I'm all for that, and I'm certain I mentioned it here months ago when the Senate recall efforts were getting underway. It bears repeating and reminding that Gableman was found by a three-judge panel appointed by the Wisconsin Supreme Court to have violated two separate provisions of the State code of judicial ethics following a hearing in Waukesha County in 2009. Since then Gableman and his out-of-State hired counsel have been both unrepentant and aggressively defiant. Moreover there is still a pending civil action against Gableman, pending due to Gableman's unsuccessful motion to win summary judgment against the Wisconsin Judicial Commission, whose members decided not to withdraw their complaint but to suspend their prosecution of it. Thus are the grounds for Gableman's removal more compelling than those for Walker's, which by comparison reduce to political policy objections.
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