Montana Supreme Court Justice Mike Wheat filed his first campaign finance report yesterday, raising nearly $40,000 since he filed for election just over one month ago.
"The support and encouragement I've received this past month is very humbling," said Wheat. "It's gratifying that so many Montanans have stepped up and provided their support to help me retain a seat on the Court," he added.
Wheat, 62, was appointed by Governor Schweitzer to fill a vacancy on the court left by former justice John Warner, who retired at the end of last year. Wheat was one of 11 candidates for the appointment, and one of only three whose name was forwarded to the Governor by the Montana Judicial Nominating Commission. By law, Wheat must run to keep the seat in the very next election and again when the term expires in 2014. So far, no one has filed to challenge him.
"I've been blessed with a beautiful family and fulfilling career and I've always tried to give back to my country and community through public service," he said. "Serving the people of Montana on the high court is a responsibility I cherish and do not take lightly." Wheat emphasized that "our judicial system is vital to our constitutional democracy."
Wheat began his legal career as a criminal prosecutor before entering private practice. For 28 years he was a partner in the Bozeman firm of Cok, Wheat & Kinzler. Wheat is a former State Senator where he served as Chair of the Judiciary Committee and a Vietnam Marine Corps combat veteran. He and his wife, Debby, have four children with a son currently in high school.
For the last week, Compassion & Choices has been airing television ads in Montana during the Olympic coverage to inform citizens about their legal right to aid in dying.
Two physicians and a Montana patient speak in the ads about choice and autonomy at the end of life.
If you have questions or need more information about end-of-life options for Montana, please call Compassion & Choices toll free at 1-800-247-7421.
The Montana Supreme Court just issued a decision that public policy of Montana does not criminalize, and much in current public policy affirmatively supports, aid in dying. The court did not reach the question of whether the Montana constitution specifically protects aid in dying.
I've got to say, it's pretty rare that I side with the conservatives on the Roberts Court, but in two recent SCOTUS decisions, I've basically come down with them: the DC gun case and the Louisiana death penalty case.
On both of these sides I've also ended up on the opposite end of most of my progressive brothers and sisters.
But then, just when I thought I was going to be all down with the Scalitos, they had to go and say that the Millionaire Amendment to McCain-Feingold violated the First Amendment, which strikes me as a damn clear case of putting issue advocacy ahead of Constitutional concerns.
I write this not to re-establish my non-existent maverick bona fides, but because I found it odd that I was agreeing with the conservative wing. I thought I'd ask my dear readers why I'm wrong (or right).
So, in preparation for 4 July 2008, give us your thoughts on our Constitution, free speech, the right to bear arms, and just how uncruel and usual punishments must be.
I have to say, I'm mildly bothered by this ruling. The Montana Supreme Court ruled that the Board of Advisers of the Bair Trust failed to perform their duties when they closed the Bair Museum -- a museum with few visitors in a very low-traffic corner of Montana. Under the terms of the trust, "the trustees [could] sell, transfer or relocate the museum and its property five years after Alberta Bair's death if 'acting on its sole judgment and discretion,' the board determined that the museum no longer served its public and educational purposes."
So the Board of Advisers acted, under its sole discretion, and was slapped down in court.
Why does this bother me?
The Bair Trusts have funded a number of fantastic charitable programs in the state (perhaps a necessary disclosure -- Forward Montana has not requested money from the Trust and has never had any plan to -- this is not a self-interested stance). Some of those programs will likely lose their funding so that a Museum in Martinsdale remain open.
Beyond that, I don't think the fundamental question for the court is whether the Board of Advisers made the right decision. The question is whether they were empowered by the Trust Agreement to make a decision. If they were allowed, after five years, to do something, it seems to me that they did it well within the scope of their authority.
NOTE: Sorry that it took me so long to put this post up. I have been having trouble getting back into the swing of the lightning-fast blogos. These are just a few thoughts I had during the visit from the leader of our judicial system. If you have similar or different reactions, drop a comment.
I have to confess that I was disappointed in Justice Roberts' actual speech. He talked about advice that he gives to young lawyers and law students. His stories were self-depricating and certainly jokesy enough. But I felt like the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court should have said something interesting about the state of justice, and instead he gave a bland talk that I have heard one hundred times in law school. Important details make all the difference, and so on. This is really not all that interesting.
Moreover, I did not think that it was aided by his reference to the Montana standard Norman Maclean. He tailored his advice to Montana by comparing it to Young Men and Fire. The gesture was nice, but like I say, the speech itself was a dull truism told countless times to law students, and I cannot imagine being a non-law student with some expectation of greatness. I won't belabor the point. He did end the speech with a fairly funny joke about the judges in hell.
On the other hand, the smaller session that he did before his public talk was much more meaty. He answered questions from students, only--one of my professors thought that this was to prevent an ideological stand by some professor who has been pouring over the same general area for years. I doubt that it would have made much of a difference, since students are often as mired in the minutia as their teachers. Like his performance during his confirmation hearings, Justice Roberts answered all of the questions without resorting to the old mantra: this case may come up before the court. Some people forget that he didn't do much of this during his confirmation hearings because Justice Alito repeated it so bloody often.
You have probably heard about this already, but Chief Justice John Roberts is coming to the UM campus today for the Jones and Tamm lecture series. This is a pretty big deal. The chief justice rarely speaks in public and it would be worth standing in lines for a few hours to listen to him. The lecture starts at 2:00 PM in the University Theater. If you can't make it, NPR is broadcasting live and will replay from 8:00-9:00 PM this evening. If you want a seat you should probably get there early.
I will probably post some thoughts later in the day about the lecture
I just read this writeup on the latest decision handed down from five men -- even in cases where gender discrimination is clearly at work, the aggrieved party only gets 180 days from the initial discriminatory decision to challenge it.
The decision was made in a case where a woman started off receiving comparable pay but slowly dipped well below what even the worst-paid man in a comparable position was paid. This wasn't a single decision in other words, it was a cumulative number of decisions.
According to Scott Lemieux, a professor of this stuff at Hunter College, this means that the court is basically saying that discriminatory pay is not a problem under statute, just the decision to pay in a discriminatory matter.
All in all -- crazy stuff, as far as I can tell.
Scott's right, though -- this is the sort of issue Congress can address very easily. They should do so.
The WaPo has an article on Supreme Court Justice Stevens, which is a pretty good read. It struck me that he has a pretty good sense of humor. He is probably the ideological counterpoint to Justice Scalia, and has a similar style to Justice Brennan in his dissents--though Scalia seems to bring out the most vituperative of him. Anyway, its worth a read.
It looks like Mike McGrath is in. The man who won his second term as Attorney General while uncontested is the first announced candidate for chief justice.
McGrath goes into this the prohibitive favorite. He is well-respected, has solid fundraising ability, and is popular in the state. Plus he just has high name ID. Anyone looking to mount a challenge will definitely think twice.
On top of that, McGrath will no doubt be a good chief justice. The job of the chief justice is to be a justice, which McGrath will likely do well, and oversee the administrative end of the court. McGrath has managed fairly large operations and comes in with a background that will be helpful.
This one took me by surprise. Chief Justice Karla Gray has announced she will not run for re-election. Who will run for Chief Justice? Good question.
Up to this point, I'd heard a couple rumors, but I doubted most of 'em because my impression was that Karla is pretty well-respected in Montana and would be tough to beat for re-election.
But now that it's an open field, let the speculating begin. I've heard two names for a race like this, not that I can come close to confirming either one of them -- Mike McGrath, our current Attorney General, and Terry Trieweiler, a former Associate Justice of the Supreme Court.
Any other names come to mind? Any current Associate Justices who might roll the dice?
