Wisconsin News and Press Releases

A Republican-sponsored bill that would restrict the ability of Wisconsin circuit court judges to block state laws has the effect of “putting citizens at risk of irreparable harm from constitutional violations,” according to two critics of the measure. 

Television spending in this year’s race for a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court topped $1.1 million, with nearly 70 percent of spending coming from conservative interest groups, according to estimates released by the Brennan Center for Justice and Justice at Stake.   

On Friday, Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Pat Roggensack and Marquette University law professor Ed Fallone jabbed back and forth at each other during a debate sponsored by the Wisconsin Bar Association and a coalition of media outlets. Read about it in Gavel Grab.  

Special interest spending on TV advertising far outpaced TV spending by candidates in the Wisconsin Supreme Court primary, according to Justice at Stake and the Brennan Center for Justice. Check out Gavel Grab for more.

Special interest spending dominated this week’s primary for a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, with the conservative Wisconsin Club for Growth spending more than $300,000 on television advertisements in support of incumbent Justice Pat Roggensack.  

Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Pat Roggensack will face Marquette University law professor Ed Fallone and lemon law attorney Vince Megna in the February 19 primary to keep her place on the bench. Roggensack has already raised more than three times as much money as her competitors. Learn more in Gavel Grab.

State Supreme Court Justice David Prosser helped appoint a critic of the ethics case against him to the state’s Judicial Commission – even though the panel could still have a hand in that case. On a 4-to-3 vote last month, the Supreme Court named retired attorney Frank Daily to the commission, which oversees the state’s entire judicial system. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel said Daily wrote a letter-to-the-editor of that paper in May, calling the ethics charges against Prosser unfair. Read more at WTAQ

State Supreme Court Justice David Prosser and three other justices have appointed a retired attorney to the Wisconsin Judicial Commission who has said the ethics case against Prosser is unfair. The court voted 4-3 to appoint Frank J. Daily to the commission last month, at a time when the case against Prosser faces major hurdles. Read more at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

When Dane County Circuit Court Judge Juan Colas ruled parts of Act 10 unconstitutional, Gov. Scott Walker pushed the easy and predictable rhetorical button. Colas, the governor charged, was a "liberal Dane County activist judge." When I was mayor we had several cases before Judge Colas. He was always regarded as thorough, fair and thoughtful even when he ruled against us. Read more at Isthmus Daily Page

Dane County Judge Juan B. Colas has gotten outraged letters and calls after ruling against parts of Act 10, Wisconsin’s law that restricted collective bargaining for many public employees. For more, see Gavel Grab. 

Gov. Scott Walker’s collective bargaining law was struck down late on the night of Friday, Sept. 14. The Wisconsin Supreme Court has yet to rule on the constitutionality of the law, but already a firestorm of debate and controversy has taken place. The most recent action in the unending battle between Walker and the unions is the governor’s request that his supporters begin signing petitions. The purpose of these petitions is to raise support and finances for the collective bargaining law. Read more at UW Badger Herald

A Dane County judge who struck down parts of Act 10, the state’s law weakening collective bargaining for some public workers, has drawn a spate of letters and phone messages expressing outrage in colorful, at times vitriolic language. “You are no more than a cheap political hack for the Marxist Democratic Party,” declares one email sent to Circuit Court Judge Juan B. Colas by someone using a fake name. Read more at the Wisconsin Law Journal

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker  launched a petition drive critical of a judge who ruled that many of Walker’s restrictions on collective bargaining rights for public workers were unconstitutional. For more, read Gavel Grab.

Gov. Scott Walker continued his attack Thursday on the judge who ruled against his limits on collective bargaining for public workers, launching a petition drive for those who support his changes.  "An activist judge in Madison chose to put politics ahead of your votes by striking down Governor Walker's good government budget reforms," the petition from Walker's campaign says. Read more at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Wisconsin Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen asked a state court judge to delay, pending appeal, a decision that laws curbing public employee collective bargaining rights are unconstitutional.  Judge Juan B. Colas in Madison on Sept. 14 ruled the legislation known as Act 10, signed by Governor Scott Walker last year, violated public workers’ rights of free speech and free association. Read more at Businessweek

In a perfect world, no one would go to court, but in our imperfect one many people who need the help or protection of the legal system can't afford entry, and even advocates committed to helping them run into barriers. Those concerns are the focus of a public hearing Thursday at Marquette University Law School, hosted by the Wisconsin Access to Justice Commission, created by the state Supreme Court and the State Bar of Wisconsin to study how to improve poor residents' navigation of the civil courts.  Read more at The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Here’s an ingenious example of using a system to your advantage. You may remember David Prosser. He’s the Wisconsin Supreme Court justice who won a re-election campaign when a clerk in Waukesha County “found” a bag of ballots at the last minute. He also made headlines for grabbing his fellow state Supreme Court justice by the neck during a deliberation, with the entire Court present. Read more in Fire Dog Lake.

Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman becomes the third member of the state’s high court to recuse himself from hearing the complaint against fellow Justice David Prosser. Read more in the Pierce County Herald.

A third Wisconsin Supreme Court justice has recused himself from the ethics case against fellow Justice David Prosser, casting doubt on whether the high court will ever hear the case. Justice Michael Gableman’s recusal today leaves the court without a quorum to hear the disciplinary case against Prosser. Read more in the Wisconsin State Journal.

The ethics case against Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice David Prosser over his altercation with a colleague last year appears all but dead now that a third justice has recused himself from hearing the matter. As expected, Justice Michael Gableman, in a decision announced Friday,  joined justices Annette Ziegler and Patience Roggensack in saying he would not take part in considering the March complaint by the Wisconsin Judicial Commission. Read more in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Advocates say low income people in Wisconsin are being denied access to justice. They made their case Tuesday in Eau Claire to a state commission looking for ways to improve legal options for those in poverty. Read more in the Superior Telegram.

Gov. Scott Walker says the process for reviewing complaints against sitting state Supreme Court justices must be one that instills confidence, but he won't say whether changes should be made. Read more in The Associated Press.

Writing in 1993, Colby College political science professor L. Sandy Maisel called political party platforms "the most important document(s) that a political party produces" but also "worthless pieces of paper," because so few voters know what they contain. Read more in the Isthmus Daily Page.

A second state Supreme Court justice has recused herself in the ethics case against Justice David Prosser, a further sign the case could end prematurely. Prosser is accused of violating the judicial ethics code by putting his hands on the neck of Justice Ann Walsh Bradley during a June 2011 dispute. Read more in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Wisconsin state judges who were among nearly a million residents who signed petitions that triggered an unsuccessful recall election against Republican Governor Scott Walker did not breach their judicial obligations, a state ethics panel has found. Read more in Reuters.