Free Republic

Patience Roggensack said Tuesday there is no doubt she is the Wisconsin Supreme Court's chief justice and that she didn't want to fight with any of her colleagues — in the process, taking jabs at how the court has been run. The justice told conservative WTMJ-AM (620) radio host Charlie Sykes she had been meeting with top court staff in recent days and planned to allow them and other justices to have more input than they have in the past. ~snip~ Roggensack did not respond to interview requests from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel last week and did not immediately respond...

This has been a week of surprises from Chief Justice John Roberts. Wednesday he joined the Court’s more liberal members in a 5-4 decision in a significant First Amendment case. Tuesday at the argument in Obergefell v. Hodges, the marriage equality cases, he suggested that a ban on same-sex marriage might present a “straightforward question of sexual discrimination.” These superficially surprising moves support Roberts’s oft-repeated claim that he believes the Justices should decide cases based on the law, not politics. But as Roberts’s tenth term as Chief Justice comes to a close, the biggest tests of that claim are still...

MADISON, Wis. – Shirley Abrahamson may be trying all she can to hold on to the reins of power, but the former state Supreme Court Justice doesn’t have the votes. On Wednesday, the four conservative members of the seven-person court took up a motion by Justice Michael Gableman to elect Justice Patience Roggensack as the court’s new chief justice. The legal reading is that Abrahamson’s nearly 20-year term as chief justice is over. “As of yesterday (there are) four votes in favor of the motion, all by email,” a source close to the court told Wisconsin Watchdog. The vote was...

MADISON, Wis. — The Washington, D.C., attorney representing Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson in her civil rights case against her peers serves on the board of directors of a George Soros-backed judicial group. Robert S. Peck is founder and president of the Center for Constitutional Litigation, which bills itself as “among the most sought-after appellate litigators within the plaintiffs’ bar.” Abrahamson tapped the constitutional law expert to represent her in a civil rights case that aims to save her powerful chief justice position from a voter-backed, state constitutional amendment approved at the polls last week. The amendment allows...

Madison— A federal judge declined Thursday to put an immediate halt on an amendment to the state constitution adopted by voters this week that would allow the members of the Wisconsin Supreme Court to choose the chief justice. The job of chief justice has automatically gone to the most senior member of the Supreme Court for the last 126 years. Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson and her supporters sued to keep her position as the court's leader on Wednesday, a day after voters approved changing how the chief justice is selected. She argues the provision can't go into effect until her...

Wailing that the Wisconsin Supreme Court is “dysfunctional” is a favorite tactic whenever Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson’s Liberal allies are trying to defeat a Conservative justice, so it’s revealing this week to see how desperate they are to preserve the status quo. As we’ve mentioned, there’s a referendum on next Tuesday’s spring election ballot. A “yes” vote would amend the Wisconsin Constitution so that the chief justice would be subject to election every two years by a vote of all seven sitting justices. This would replace the current system, in which the chief justice is whichever one has been on...

Madison -- Groups called on voters Monday to reject a proposed amendment to the Wisconsin constitution that would allow state Supreme Court justices to select their chief justice, rather than have the position go to the most senior member of the court. If approved April 7, the change is expected to dislodge Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson from the court's top job. Abrahamson would remain on the high court but no longer have administrative control of it. Mike Wilder of Wisconsin Voices said at a Capitol news conference that the current system -- where voters elected Abrahamson to a 10-year term...

One of the most overlooked aspects of the year just ended is the vindication of Chief Justice John Roberts -- a vindication that showed up as the national catastrophe known as ObamaCare got rolling. Roberts may have also doomed Hillary Clinton's chance to live in the White House again. The chief justice, an appointee of President George W. Bush and reputedly a constitutionalist in his jurisprudence, set his diabolical trap (diabolical to Democrats) on June 28, 2012, when he joined with the four liberal justices on the Supreme Court to uphold the constitutionality of ObamaCare. Conservatives and Republicans across the...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will nominate Tani Cantil-Sakauye, a Republican appellate court justice with a reputation as a moderate, to be chief justice of the California Supreme Court, The Bee learned Tuesday. Cantil-Sakauye, 50, of Sacramento is a former prosecutor and Sacramento Superior Court judge. She would replace Chief Justice Ronald George, who has announced he will retire Jan. 2. Cantil-Sakauye has been on the 3rd District Court of Appeal since 2005. If approved by a three-member commission and by voters in November, she would start a 12-year term in January. She would be the state's first Filipina American chief justice.

From issuing historic rulings on gay marriage, affirmative action and abortion rights to ushering in a new era of legal and political clout for California's highest court, Chief Justice Ronald George has cast a long shadow of influence across the state since the mid-1990s. On Wednesday, California's 27th chief justice decided it was time to step aside, unexpectedly announcing he will not seek a new 12-year term in November and will put an official end to the "George Court" on Jan. 2. The 70-year-old George said he will retreat from his notoriously frenetic life to read, run and travel —...

Chief Justice John Roberts is not stepping down from the Supreme Court, despite a celebrity gossip report, a source very close to Roberts told Fox News. RadarOnline.com reported Thursday that Roberts, 55, would be resigning for personal reasons. But the source said the report is "completely untrue." There is "no medical issue, no issue at all," the source said, adding that there is not even a 1 percent chance that Roberts is considering resignation.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. – The chief justice of the California Supreme Court is criticizing the state's reliance on the referendum process, saying it has "rendered our state government dysfunctional." .. the widespread use of referendums to change state laws and constitutions hampers legislators, burdens the judicial branch and gives special interests too much power. George says the system places California's lawmakers in a "fiscal straitjacket" that prevents them from effectively solving the state's financial crisis. The speech .. entitled "The Perils of Direct Democracy: The California Experience."

A panel of federal judges admonished Alex Kozinski, chief judge of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, on Thursday for being "judicially imprudent" and "exhibiting poor judgment" by placing sexually explicit photos and videos on an Internet server that could be accessed by the public. Kozinski's conduct had "created a public controversy that can reasonably be seen as having resulted in embarrassment to the institution of the federal judiciary," according to the panel's opinion, written by Anthony J. Scirica, chief judge of the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals. The judges ruled, however, that Kozinski's actions did not constitute...

A clip from the appearance by Chief Justice John Roberts at the University of Idaho on March 13. Roberts is being questioned about a case involving Barack Obama’s citizenship. http://media.spokesman.com/audio_clips/2009/03/robertstaitz.mp3 Audio Clip

On December 5, 2008, we said: "Questions have been raised as to whether Chief Justice John Roberts could administer the oath of office to a man who he believes may not be entitled. Chief Justice John G. Roberts will have to KNOW that Barack Hussein Obama II is eligible to 'enter on the execution of his office,' before he administers the Inaugural Oath of Office.'" The Chief Justice of the United States did not make a mistake when he flubbed the oath of office. He did not want to issue the oath to Obama because of his doubts. By failing...

The presidential oath of office should be re-administered to Barack Obama because of his flub during Tuesday’s swearing-in ceremony, legal experts say. Because of a mistake by Chief Justice John Roberts, Obama transposed one of the words in the oath. He should have said he will “faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States,” but instead repeated Roberts’ cue and said he will “execute the Office of President of the United States faithfully.” Josh White of the Washington Post noted: “The presidential oath of office is required of a new president before he can execute his power, and...

John Roberts writes dissent that debuts new genre: Supreme Court noir The Supreme Court of the United States. Just after 10 o'clock. John Roberts was working his usual shift. Chief justice of the United States. Three years on the job. His reputation? Incisive questioner. Good writer. Fast. Funny. Roberts knows his way around an opinion. Even a dissent. Like the one he issued Tuesday. The case? Pennsylvania's top court threw out a drug bust because the police officer who saw an apparent exchange between two suspects did not have enough evidence to make the arrest. Roberts wanted his court to...

From the Book of Common Prayer, 1928.A Prayer for Recovery. O GOD of heavenly powers, who, by the might of thy command, drivest away from men’s bodies all sickness and all infirmity; Be present in thy goodness with this thy servant JOHN, that his weakness may be banished and his strength recalled; that his health being thereupon restored, he may bless thy holy Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. A Prayer for Healing. O ALMIGHTY God, who art the giver of all health, and the aid of them that turn to thee for succour; We entreat thy strength and...

In a pointed dissent from decisions overturning death sentences for two Texas inmates, Roberts accused Stevens of engaging in revisionist history......... Roberts concluded his 16-page dissent on a sarcastic note, at odds with his amiable image. "Still, perhaps there is no reason to be unduly glum," Roberts said, taking direct aim at Stevens. "After all, today the author of a dissent issued in 1988 writes two majority opinions concluding that the views established in that dissent actually represented 'clearly established' federal law at that time. So there is hope yet for the views expressed in this dissent." "Encouraged by the...

The framers of the United States Constitution believed that people of African descent “had no rights which the white man was bound to respect,” and that “the negro might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit…. [to be] bought and sold and treated as an ordinary article of merchandise and traffic, whenever profit could be made by it.” With reference to the words “all men are created equal” in the Declaration of Independence: “It is too clear for dispute that the enslaved African race was not intended to be included, and formed no part of the people...