Litigation

Wednesday Gavel Grab Briefs

By Peter Hardin

In these other dispatches about fair and impartial courts:

• President Obama’s in-their-face “scolding” of the Supreme Court over its Citizens United ruling at the State of the Union address, and Justice Samuel Alito Jr.’s headshake and mouthing “not true” in response, marked the defining moments of the high court’s year, Tony Mauro writes in a National Journal commentary.

• In Wisconsin,  a state board adopted an emergency rule that may make it harder for citizens to know who is funding certain political attack ads, the Associated Press reported. Among critics of the rule was Mike McCabe of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, a Justice at Stake partner.

• A Spokane Spokesman-Review editorial favored cameras in federal courtrooms. It reasoned:

“[T]he branch of government that?s done a reasonably good job of protecting the public?s right to keep an eye on legislators, governors and presidents has kept itself beyond the reach of the most immediate and, at times, most accurate means of informing the people about government?s activities.”

Full post as published by The Gavel on December 29, 2010 (boomark / email).