March 29, 2011 - 3:32 pm
She blocked it, the state published it anyway, so now she’s trying to revise and extend the original block.
Dane County Circuit Judge Maryann Sumi said Tuesday that her earlier restraining order saying the law shouldn’t be enacted had either been ignored or misinterpreted.
Sumi stopped short of saying the law was not already in effect. She says she will take more testimony on that issue.
Hm. Gov. Walker could end up whacking both government union power and judicial activism in one shot.
Sorta like the decision against Obamacare, huh?
if the law is legal by standards of Federal & State Constitutions, then the judge is practicing activism in the strictist sense of the word, & should be reprimanded by a higher court.
It is not activism, she was just doing her job. She had not ruled on the merits yet, so I do not know why you are in such a hissy fit. She just issued a restraining order on implementation of the law until she could hear the arguments. This is standard operating procedure. There is a lot of discretion by trial courts in issuing TROs, and it is highly unlikely she would be overturned by an appellate court. Do people here no nothing of how our courts work?
Brian N, you are either incredibly blind or willfully naive. Perhaps both. Under our very noses activist judges are using loose logic and procedures that don’t apply to usurp what they feel is a “conservative agenda” which is anathema to the socialist agenda. If you haven’t noticed, the two are diametrically opposed. One is founded on the Constitution and the other is founded on Cloward & Piven and Marx. Walker and the state government legally passed a bill into law. The fact that the state democrats were absent is immaterial. The state government passed a law and then published it, as per the requirements of the law. The national socialists of Wisconsin have taken umbrage to the proceedings and are now grasping at straws to try to subvert established law by allowing local public opinion to override the law. Just for a moment, try to think what would happen if the roles were reversed. You can stick your head in the sand or you can be a thinker and recognize crap when you see it.
She was not just doing her job. First of all, judges are supposed to rule on matters of law. This wasn’t a law yet. What would be normal procedure is to let the law be published (and go into effect) and then immediately issue the TRO to prevent enforcement pending judicial review. By issuing a TRO before it became law, she was interfering in the legislative process, and it is unlikely she even has jurisdiction on a bill in process in light of separation of powers.
Second, the general purpose of a TRO is to preserve the status quo pending the anticipated ruling. She issued a TRO to change the situation in a political dispute where there is credible appearance of a personal bias.
So to summarize: it could fairly be interpreted that she used a TRO in an improper way (and against the wrong parties) to affect the outcome of a legislative process over which she has no jurisdiction in a way that significantly benefits a close family member and her political party. All when had she waited less than a week she could have issued an order against the just-publihed law that would have had a similar effect without injuring her office and its reputation.
This is a banana-republic level free-for-all and (in my case at least) my disgust has nothing to do with the political outcome of the decision. If an “activist judge” is one who worked backward from the desired result by making up law as she goes along rather than interpreting the plain law written by the legislature, then the shoe fits.
no she shouldn’t be reprimanded. she should be removed from the bench(as shoult many others) and further she should be DISBARRED, I get so sick and tired of Judges trying to over rule our elected officials,
The next act of the Wisconsin legislature should be a judicial reorganization act, abolishing the Dane County Circuit court.
As a resident of Wisconsin, I find this whole situation completely depressing. Last fall after our elections, both houses of our legislature switched to Republican control, and we got ourselves a Republican Governor, too. (We also elected a Republican U.S. Senator, and several Republican House members.) It was the largest sweep from Blue to Red in the entire nation. We elected these people to fix the horrible financial situation that the Democrats (with their union handlers) saddled us with for the last decade. In the lame duck session, the Democrats shoved through a number of deals that favored the unions before the Republicans took over. It was brazen partisanship. They didn’t care. They even had to spring one of their own from jail to get his vote.
And now they are essentially trying to undo last November’s election by using the courts, political tricks, and their Madison Mobs.
I fear for the future of our state. If they succeed here, I fear for the future of our country.
Drew, Don’t get depressed, GET MAD!
Then channel that anger and fan it in others. Remember that these Democrat politicians are puppets of the unions and organized crime. The people protesting your Governor and organizing petitions for recall of Republicans are anti-liberty communists and socialists without real jobs, leaches on the tax paying public of Wisconsin.
Drew, i agree with Warren – the people of WI spoke last November – they spoke loud and clear with the sweeping successes at the ballot box. Realize that most of those loud-mouthed, unwashed, idiots who have been making your state look bad can’t vote in WI – oh i wish all those protesters had to be vetted by WI ID before coming on to the Capitol grounds – keep your chin up, and stay mad – you can again show these communists that the real people of WI meant business, and still mean it!! Good luck – wish i could come up there & vote with you!!!
3. William and 4. nukebubba: I love how it is judicial activism if you do not care for the decision. The judge has not made any law yet or ruled on the law, but she did issue a temporary restraining order until she could rule on the merits of the case. This is how the courts always work, and it completely by the book. What is out of the ordinary is the Governors office saying they do not have to listen to the judge and publicly stating so. This is what is called a constitutional crisis. We have three equal branches of government, and the other branches have to respect each other. This is part of the constitution. What the Walker administration is doing is flaunting the law and claiming they are above it. This is not good for our society.
Brian N, On what grounds did she issue the order? On procedural grounds? The law she is looking into takes all of five minutes to read, understand and follow. She is a follower of socialism and desirous of a winning outcome for the national socialists, AKA public sector unions. It’s like a baseball umpire stopping a game because he believes he needs to measure the distance between the pitcher’s mound and home plate. Wake up and see what is really happening. People here aren’t upset because the judge made a decision they don’t like. People are upset because she tried to stop a logical, acceptable and necessary law from going into effect. Walker is trying to curtail government spending as required by his constituents. Anyone who has ever had a household budget can see that. Teachers and all public sector employees can’t seem to realize that the money simply isn’t there. Raising taxes isn’t the answer. Stopping the locked-throttle freight train that is government spending is the only answer. Why are you so dense?
I love how if Obama “ignores” a court order it is grounds for impeachment here, but if a republican does so, it is good. Can people not even see how blatant your double standards are?
VOTE for Judge Prosser on April 5th or we will have another unqualified idiot lawyer on the Supreme Court. SUE-ME should be impeached for not following the law and following the liberal playbook of trying to change a lawful act by improper use of the court system. She also wants to please her “Union Activist Son”