How does one pronounce “Dush?”
Good for this guy. How did the lone remaining sane Republican in PA end up Chief Justice of their SC anyway?
Well at least the Republicans are not trying to change the rules in the middle of the game. They are changing the referee’s in the middle of the game.
More like having a tantrum, then changing the refs.
Ever take a close look at one of those pocket constitutions the GOPers carry around?
There’s a special clause in there, just for them. It’s called “the whiny baby gets a bottle of juice” clause.
I don’t see this happening. If they try it there will be lawsuits aplenty accusing them of exactly what this R judge is accusing them of. They would be tied up in ligation for the remainder of their terms.
“12 state representatives behind a series of impeachment resolutions, announced Tuesday, are among the 203-member House”
The PA legislature is almost as over “represented” as New Hampshire, and just as crazy, but this is the first time I have seen an accounting of Dush motion supporters. 12/203 is only 6%.
Long way to go, assholes.
This happened similarly in California in 1986, where Rose Bird – the chief justice – was thrown out politically.
Doesn’t that story say the GOP leadership has come out against the stupid? And really, the campaign ads write themselves.
Lawmakers in at least a half-dozen states have sought in recent years to impeach or otherwise remove judges as a result of controversial decisions — including in some instances over same-sex marriage rulings — but without success, according to the National Center for State Courts.
Here in Kansas, we’ve seen a novel variation on this trend. Throughout the Brownback administration, the state supreme court ruled several times that state schools were underfunded. (There’s a constitutional mandate that public schools be adequately funded.) Finally, a couple of years ago, conservative members of the House proposed, with Brownback’s support, an amendment to the state constitution that would strip the court of its power to rule on the matter of school funding. Fortunately, it never got anywhere.
Still–some of these people are so strict constructionist, by God, they’ll rewrite the constitution to make it say what they want it to say.
If this current PA legislature wants to go where the one did that wanted to give themselves a pay raise when folks were losing jobs in an economic downturn, GO AHEAD, MAKE MY DAY. Organized opposition across the state made them choke. If they think people will let them get away with this nonsense, they really are a special kind of stupid.
All people have to do is take a look at the new district formats and see how much more reasonable the new plan is. They had a chance to work with the court and blew it. Nowhere does it say the Court has to kiss their asses.
Shut up, Comrade Chief Justice. The Courts exist solely for the use of the Executive like they do in Russia for Putin. You are overstepping your authority protesting anything. Get in line or get ran over by Trump. He’s going to be gunning for you.
Until Putin consolidates more power at this White House and instructs his puppet to dissolve all our courts and appoint his own “associates.”
So the Legislature threatens the Supreme Court …
Tom Wolf should surround the building with a well regulated militia
while they have their vote …
And arrest any who try and ’ disturb the peace ’ ----
Democrats on the elected court hold a 5-2 majority.
Elected. Let me repeat that. Elected.
When gerrymandering has no effect, this is what you get in PA.
The longest serving justice automatically becomes Chief Justice, per Wikipedia.
“Do not piss off a judge” is one of those rules to live by, along with “do not meddle in the affairs of wizards” and “do not feed the bears”. Also “do not look into laser with remaining eyeball” and “never ever antagonize the intelligence community”.
I don’t think they are at all similar. Rose Bird was tossed out by a vote of the people.
She got destroyed in a retention election, losing 67% to 33%.
The main reason was her opposition to the death penalty. She voted to reverse all 64 cases brought before the California Supreme Court. She was joined by 3 other justices on 61 of them. (There are 7 justices, so these cases were reversed 4-3.)
But that wasn’t the only reason. From wikipedia:
Bird reviewed a total of 64 capital cases appealed to the court. In each instance she issued a decision overturning the death penalty that had been imposed at trial. She was joined in her decision to overturn by at least three other members of the court in 61 of those cases.[2] This led Bird’s critics to claim that she was substituting her own opinions and ideas for the laws and precedents upon which judicial decisions are supposed to be made.[11] She also ruled that the state Constitution required that the state provide free abortions for poor women.[12] In 1982, a Bird ruled that the proposed California Proposition 8 (1982), known as The Victims’ Bill of Rights, not be allowed on the ballot.[13] A 4-3 majority of the Court allowed it to be voted on. In 1984, Bird and a majority of the Court it granted the American Federation of Labor’s 1984 original petition to block a balanced budget amendment proposition from appearing on the ballot.[14] In addition, the Bird court struck down California’s “use a gun, go to jail” law that made a prison term mandatory for any crime in which the use of a gun was involved. The anti-Bird campaign ran television commercials featuring the relatives of the victims of the murderers whose sentences Bird and her fellow justices Cruz Reynoso, Joseph Grodin, and Allen Broussard had voted to reverse.[15] She was removed in the November 4, 1986 election by a margin of 67% to 33% after a high-profile campaign that cited her categorical opposition to the death penalty.[16] In addition to Bird, Reynoso and Grodin were also voted off the seven-justice California state supreme court bench. Justice Stanley Mosk, who often joined Bird, Reynoso, and Grodin, was not challenged nor were the other three justices.
I was a young, liberal college student at the time, so I was part of the 33% that voted to retain.
However, in hindsight 30 years later, she really was the poster child for an activist judge legislating from the bench.