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My (Not So) Funny Valentine

By E.L. Lipman

At the close of last year, the Chief Justice of the Minnesota Supreme Court, Russell A. Anderson, signed an Order requesting public comment on some recently proposed amendments to the Minnesota Code of Judicial Conduct.

The proposals are the work of the Ad Hoc Advisory Committee on the Code. This Committee was established in January of last year to ?study the need for and advisability of further amendments to Canon 5 and other provisions of the Minnesota Code of Judicial Conduct,? following the decisions of the United States Supreme Court and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit which invalidated portions of the Code.

The close of the public comment period on the proposed Amendments is the day after Valentine?s Day ? Friday, February 15, 2008.

My own personal view is that the proposed changes are a step in the wrong direction and, if adopted, will draw the State of Minnesota into yet another round of costly civil rights litigation.

I am hoping is that readers of this site will likewise take a peek at the Committee Report, and submit their own assessments of the proposed rules sometime during the next month. (I was one of only two people who submitted written comments to the Committee during its deliberations; a number which, regardless of one's views, deserves to be higher this time around....)

Here are some related links: The Court?s Order requesting public comment and the complete set of Committee proposals is accessible here. The comments that I submitted to the Court are accessible here. The decision of the en banc panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in Republican Party of Minnesota v. White is accessible here.

Send your comments; or chocolates; or flowers ? but send something to the Court this Valentine?s Day!

Full post as published by Within the Scope on January 13, 2008 (boomark / email).