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Tuesday, December 01, 2009
Courts - "New recusal rules for Mich. Supreme Court under fire"
Mark Hornbeck reports today in the Detroit News in a story that begins:
Lansing -- New rules governing disqualification of justices adopted late Thanksgiving eve by the Michigan Supreme Court have touched off controversy about whether the standards are fairly drawn and constitutional.The state's high court voted 4-3 Wednesday in favor of administrative rules that would let the court decide whether to disqualify a justice from considering a case in which the jurist has an apparent bias or conflict of interest. Until now, decisions about recusal were made by the justice in question.
The rules were crafted in reaction to a decision handed down this summer by the U.S. Supreme Court. In that ruling, the federal justices said there was a due process violation in a case involving a $3 million contribution from a corporate executive officer to the campaign of a West Virginia judge who was about to consider overturning a $50 million judgment against the donor's company. The judge in that case didn't disqualify himself.
"We don't want a situation like that in Michigan," Chief Justice Marilyn Jean Kelly said on Detroit talk radio Monday. "The constitutional rights of judges don't overbalance the right of the people to get a fair trial."
But Justices Maura Corrigan and Robert Young, who cast dissenting votes on the rule change, questioned the authority of the court to disqualify a justice and the constitutionality of removing from a case a judge elected to office. They also questioned what they called "vague impropriety standards" that could be considered grounds for disqualification and be used to alter the balance of the court on important cases.
"This is a huge threat to our liberties as Americans," Corrigan said.
She wrote in her dissenting opinion that "it is always wise to be wary of any government action taken the day before a holiday or late on a Friday."
Justice Stephen Markman wrote that the new rule opens up the potential of "gamesmanship" and "politicization" of the recusal process.
The court is deeply divided between Justices Corrigan, Young and Markman, who were nominated by the Republican Party, and justices Kelly, Michael Cavanagh and Diane Hathaway, who were nominated by Democrats. Justice Elizabeth Weaver also was nominated by the GOP but is seen as a moderate swing vote on the court who usually sides with the Democratic-leaning jurists. The justices have feuded in recent months over administrative rules and the closing of judicial offices as well as demonstrating sharp differences in cases before the court.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on December 1, 2009 01:08 PM
Posted to Courts in general