A few days ago, I posted a diary titled "Shaken to my Core" which came THISCLOSE to making it to the Rec list.
The good news is that it got front-paged at MichiganLiberal and BloggingForMichigan, which makes sense since it regards a Michigan Supreme Court race, so I guess I can't complain too much. Even so, a few more developments have caused me to take another shot at it here.
As Eric11 put it at MichLib, outside of the Presidential race, this is probably the single most important race in Michigan.
A bit of backstory, thanks to DumpTerryMacAuliffe's excellent primers:
In January 2007, the seven justices of the Michigan Supreme Court elected Clifford Taylor as Chief Justice for that year. The vote was 4-to-3, with the four-vote conservative majority (Stephen Markman, Maura Corrigan, Robert Young, and Taylor) voting as a bloc. One of the dissenters, Justice Elizabeth Weaver, wrote a memorandum explaining why she opposed Taylor's election and put it on her personal website.
Justice Weaver's memorandum portrays the court as seriously dysfunctional, and lays the blame at the doorstep of the the conservative majority. In fact, she said that none of the four conservatives were fit to serve as Chief Justice.
As for Chief Justice Taylor, she minced no words in opposing his election:
Chief Justice Taylor has proven that he cannot properly lead the Michigan Supreme Court at this time. The people of Michigan deserve to have a Chief Justice who will conduct the people’s business in an orderly, professional, and fair manner.
How Dysfunctional is the Michigan Supreme Court?
OK, so just how bad is Taylor? So bad that the University of Chicago Law School released a study earlier this year declaring that Michigan's Supreme Court is America's Worst.
There are 52 state courts of last resort in America (Texas and Oklahoma have separate high courts for civil and criminal cases). The Supreme Court of Michigan ranked 40th in productivity. It handed down an average of 16.2 opinions per justice per year, compared to 58.3 for the top-ranked supreme court, Georgia. Our highest court ranked 42nd in quality of opinions. Its opinions were cited only one-fourth as often as those from number-one state supreme court, California. Finally, our highest court ranked 52nd in independence, with a minus-0.31 rating. In other words, its justices were more likely to vote as a bloc than those of any other top court--and by a considerable margin even compared to the next least-independent court, the Supreme Court of Indiana.
Using an equal weight composite ranking of the three criteria, the Supreme Court of Michigan finished--drum roll, please--dead last, well behind the second-worst court, the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals.
The Chicago researchers didn't delve into the politics of the Michigan Supreme Court, but they're hardly a secret and relevant as hell. Six of the seven justices joined the court during John Engler's 12 years as governor. Engler appointed Chief Justice Clifford Taylor to the court in 1997 and Justice Steven Markman in 1999; and he also appointed Justices Robert Young and Maura Corrigan to the Court of Appeals, the state's second-highest court. Taylor, Markman, Young, and Corrigan are the "Federalist Four," justices who have ties to The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies which functions as a right-wing farm system for the federal courts and, increasingly, the state courts.
OK, so...what are some of the horrible decisions made by Taylor and his ultra-right buddies?
Thanks to Justice for Michigan, a project of the MDP Justice Caucus, here's just a handful of examples (disclosure: I just took over as webmaster for the JC, and have been appalled at what I've learned about Taylor, as my previous diary explains):
Michigan Supreme Court Denies Recovery, And A Day In Court, For Mothers Who Lost Six Young Children Who Perished In Preventable Fire In Government Housing
The case in a nutshell: a city-owned apartment had faulty wiring which was left unrepaired for months in spite of repeated complaints about it; eventually this led to an apartment fire which killed six young children. Four courts ruled that the city was responsible; Cliff Taylor, Chief Justice of the state Supreme Court, ruled otherwise. Worse yet, he apparently dozed off during the proceedings.
Cliff Taylor’s Court allows employers to ignore sexually aggressive comments between employees
In a nutshell: Female night-shift security guard is sexually harassed by her supervisor for months; complains to company repeatedly; no action taken. Eventually he rapes her at the workplace. She sues the company for failing to take any action of any sort. Taylor's response? Essentially, "Tough luck, fuck off"
Lisa Brown sued her employer for failing to take action against her fellow employee after she had notified the employer of the months-long litany of degrading, demeaning and violent verbal attacks.
She sued the company. She won at the trial court. She won at the Court of Appeals.
The Michigan Supreme Court ruled that it – not a jury – should determine whether or not the employer should have foreseen that Mr. Brown would have raped his fellow employee.
The Court found that the employer could not have anticipated that its employee would have raped Ms. Brown – despite the repeated sexual taunts, late night hour shifts, his supervisory control over her and secluded situations. The Court found that the employer could not have foreseen that its supervisor would engage in this criminal act unless he had made an appointment to commit the crime by stating, “Next time we are alone, I’m going to rape you.”
Justice Taylor’s fellow “gang-of-four” member Justice Markman took an even harsher view. Justice Markman stood shoulder-to-shoulder with employers that shut their eyes to their employees. He stated that a jury cannot be trusted to decide whether an employee should have been protected from rape because the result would create confusion and uncertainty for employers.
UPDATE: The Michigan Democratic Party just launched another ad about this specific case:
Look, I know there's a zillion other races to concentrate on, but please take a few minutes to learn more about this race, about Cliff Taylor, and about his challenger, Circuit Court Judge Diane Hathaway:
http://www.justice4michigan.org
http://www.judgehathawayforsupremeco...
It's also VERY important to make sure that Michigan voters understand that voting a Democratic "straight ticket" won't include Hathaway because it's officially a non-partisan race. Therefore, make sure to FLIP THE BALLOT and vote for Hathaway on the NON-PARTISAN section.
OK, so now I get to answer the question, what's the "new development" which is causing me to put this up again?
Answer: A new poll shows that THIS RACE IS WINNABLE!!
Of particular interest to political insiders is the state Supreme Court race. While the positions are technically nonpartisan, the parties nominate candidates, and Taylor, a staunch conservative, is a GOP nominee. He got support from just 19 percent of voters, tied with the Democratic nominee, Circuit Court Judge Diane Hathaway. Almost two-thirds of voters were undecided, making the last 12 days of the race, in which Taylor has a significant financial advantage and has been advertising heavily on TV, decisive.
Oh, and as a bonus--guess who one of Taylor's biggest supporters is?
Not much of a surprise: