Editorial: Why Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Elect Maureen O'Connor Was A Better Choice Than Chief Justice Eric Brown For The Black Community
Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Elect Maureen O'Connor
Outgoing Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Eric Brown
From the Metro Desk of theDeterminerWeekly.Com and
the Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog and Media Network
(An editorial by Editor Kathy Wray Coleman)
I predicted that Ohio Supreme Court sitting justice Maureen O' Connor, 61, would beat recently appointed Chief Justice Eric Brown on Tuesday for the chief justice seat, and so did a large number of others. And her win over Brown is still better for the Black community, even though O'Connor is a Republican and Brown, a Democrat that hails from Cuyahoga County but spent recent years as a Franklin County Common Pleas judge, the county that includes the city of Columbus, the state's capital. Women can clap too, since Justice O'Connor becomes the first female to hold Ohio's chief justice slot, one that voters decide rather than the process of peer selection among sitting justices.
Outgoing Democratic Gov. Ted Strickland appointed Brown in May to replace Republican Chief Justice Thomas Moyer, who died unexpectedly a month prior at 70 years of age and could not run for reelection this year because of the state's mandated retirement of its judges at either 70 or after the completion of a current term at or above that age. But the incumbency status was not enough to catapult Brown to a win. Ohio's voters simply were not having it as socioeconomic's and racism were tearing at the Democratic Party and stiflingly the presidency of America's first Black president nationally and in the pivotal state where no Republican has won the White House without first winning Ohio. Brown did not feel the heat alone as Democrats were hurting in both state and national races in Ohio and in some other states like Kentucky, and the Dems lost control of the U.S. House of Representatives but retained it in the Senate.
Brown was a long shot. Aside from Justice Alice Robie Resnick, who was elected in 1988 and served three-terms until 2007, voters have not elected a Democrat to the state's high court in at least a decade and it certainly was not going to happen this year as Republicans on Tuesday embarrassed the Democrats with an all out sweep in Ohio, snatching the governorship from Strickland with John Kasich and bringing home wins for the U.S. Senate and 1 additional U.S. House of Representatives seat , not to mention secretary of state, attorney general, auditor and treasurer, and a host of additional seats in Ohio's Senate and House of Representatives. And O'Connor has supporters across political lines having been Ohio's Lt. Gov. from 1993-2000 under then Gov. Bob Taft, who completed his second and last term in 2000 amid scandal, including a misdemeanor criminal conviction for taking gifts in office.
Brown is now the only Democrat on Ohio's high court and Tuesday's election returned it to its all Republican status. If there is one political venue where Republicans have an absolute strong hold in Ohio it is the state's high court, an interesting comparison to Cuyahoga County where Democrats usually win and only 10 percent of registered voters are Republican. Brown did not even win in his native county of Cuyahoga County, which includes Cleveland and is Ohio's largest, and he lost in Franklin County too, where he currently lives and serves as chief justice, a signature outcome that explains his overall defeat statewide on Tuesday. And a defeat it was, as O'Connor walked away with 68 percent of the vote.
Now why is O'Connor's win better for the Black community? I must first explain that an all Republican and all White Ohio Supreme Court is bad for everybody where the absence of diversity even relative to partisan politics simply does not yield a Democratic process that Ohioans can be proud of. Big business usually wins when Republicans are in control in Washington, and on all levels of the political continuum. That is not good for the Black community anyway you cut it, though Ohio's high court decision this decade that branded its system of funding public education partially through property taxes unconstitutional because it discriminates against poor school districts, some predominantly Black like Cleveland, is a departure from its typical conservative decisions . Still, poor children, years later, await a constitutional revision that is not anti-Black, anti-poor people and anti-Democratic.
O'Connor is better suited to push for compliance with her court's mandate for the Ohio State Legislature to constututionally revise the state's system of funding public education to help poor children than the Democrat Brown, who backed Strickland's bandaid approach to the public school funding issue. That approach, to the detriment of poor Black and other children, provides for the phasing of projects over the next 10 years to expand monies for poor school districts with an ongoing forum for property rich school districts to still collect taxes to keep the process unconstitutional for poor kids.
Given that Ohio is simply going to have an all Republican court for now and had Brown won, an overwhelmingly Republican court, O'Connor was the best choice. Brown alone could not influence majority decisions of the seven-member Ohio Supreme Court with any vigor, and his Republican colleagues did not like him as a whole as he came aboard crying that Democrats need to be represented on the state's high court bench when voters had said no to them over and over and over.
The role of the chief justice is powerful and Brown was abusing his short term power. In addition to the power to appoint lawyers, judges and others to grievance and other committees, and a host of other activities, the chief justice assigns visiting judges to cases where county common pleas judges are disqualified from hearing them via an affidavit of prejudice by a complaining party for conflict or bias. And the assigned judge is usually a retired judge, in violation of the mandatory retirement age of 70 that Ohio's constitution dictates, though here state law conflicts with the retirement age mandate outlined in Ohio's constitution.
But state law does not permit in any way the assignment by the chief justice of visiting judges to replace municipal court judges disqualified via conflict or bias from hearing a case and mandates a sitting judge from the county selected by that county's presiding judge of the court of common pleas, where felony and other cases are heard. Like the recently deceased Moyer, Brown was usurping the role of Ohio's common pleas court presiding judges and assigning visiting judges to hear cases where an Ohio municipal court judge from Cleveland, Berea, Lyndhurst and elsewhere would disqualify him or herself due to conflict or bias. Brown would often assign a visiting judge from a far away city who was either retired or no longer a judge and that person would cost excess tax dollars to travel throughout the state, coupled with sometimes coming to town, violating the law, and running back home without consequences from voters or otherwise. And Blacks and the little people would be disproportionately impacted by the biased visiting judge process, often being forced to endure judicial abuse.
O'Connor now has the power to make changes to the court system that reflect a commitment to the fair administration of justice and an assignment process to replace municipal court judges subject to disqualification that does not disenfranchise the community and that complies with state law and Ohio's Rules of Superintendence, namely Ohio Revised Code 2701.031 and Rule 17 of the Rules of Superintendence. The chief justice elect said while campaigning that she would make sweeping changes, including a recommendation for panels to make accepted recommendations for the appointment of judges by Ohio's governors, a change that would require a change in the current state law on the matter.
For clarification, other judges like the chief justice or a presiding judge of a court of common pleas assign judges to cases as visiting judges when sitting judges are disqualified or cannot serve temporarily. On the other hand, the governor, by state law, appoints judges to replace judges that can no longer serve due to a seat open when a judge is elected to another court or via the inability for an elected sitting judge to serve for 90 days or more, and those such appointed judges must seek election thereafter to retain the seat.
O'Connor says she wants a panel to make recommendations as to the appointment of judges by the governor. We hope she still feels this way since Republican John Kasich is the governor elect and we hope that Justice O'Connor will push for the selection of judges via a random draw judicial pool when they are disqualified from hearing cases at all levels beginning with Ohio's municipal courts. No single judge, whether it is a presiding judge of a common pleas court or the chief justice of the Ohio Supreme Court, should have the sole power to assign judges where absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Neither Blacks nor others can stand an assignment process of visiting judges in municipal and commmon pleas court cases that is manipulated by special interests and if the judges serving in Ohio's highest court are reluctant to fair play in this arena, the damage transcends the Black community and reaches far beyond our imaginations. Congratulations to the chief justice elect.
Outgoing Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Eric Brown
From the Metro Desk of theDeterminerWeekly.Com and
the Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog and Media Network
(An editorial by Editor Kathy Wray Coleman)
I predicted that Ohio Supreme Court sitting justice Maureen O' Connor, 61, would beat recently appointed Chief Justice Eric Brown on Tuesday for the chief justice seat, and so did a large number of others. And her win over Brown is still better for the Black community, even though O'Connor is a Republican and Brown, a Democrat that hails from Cuyahoga County but spent recent years as a Franklin County Common Pleas judge, the county that includes the city of Columbus, the state's capital. Women can clap too, since Justice O'Connor becomes the first female to hold Ohio's chief justice slot, one that voters decide rather than the process of peer selection among sitting justices.
Outgoing Democratic Gov. Ted Strickland appointed Brown in May to replace Republican Chief Justice Thomas Moyer, who died unexpectedly a month prior at 70 years of age and could not run for reelection this year because of the state's mandated retirement of its judges at either 70 or after the completion of a current term at or above that age. But the incumbency status was not enough to catapult Brown to a win. Ohio's voters simply were not having it as socioeconomic's and racism were tearing at the Democratic Party and stiflingly the presidency of America's first Black president nationally and in the pivotal state where no Republican has won the White House without first winning Ohio. Brown did not feel the heat alone as Democrats were hurting in both state and national races in Ohio and in some other states like Kentucky, and the Dems lost control of the U.S. House of Representatives but retained it in the Senate.
Brown was a long shot. Aside from Justice Alice Robie Resnick, who was elected in 1988 and served three-terms until 2007, voters have not elected a Democrat to the state's high court in at least a decade and it certainly was not going to happen this year as Republicans on Tuesday embarrassed the Democrats with an all out sweep in Ohio, snatching the governorship from Strickland with John Kasich and bringing home wins for the U.S. Senate and 1 additional U.S. House of Representatives seat , not to mention secretary of state, attorney general, auditor and treasurer, and a host of additional seats in Ohio's Senate and House of Representatives. And O'Connor has supporters across political lines having been Ohio's Lt. Gov. from 1993-2000 under then Gov. Bob Taft, who completed his second and last term in 2000 amid scandal, including a misdemeanor criminal conviction for taking gifts in office.
Brown is now the only Democrat on Ohio's high court and Tuesday's election returned it to its all Republican status. If there is one political venue where Republicans have an absolute strong hold in Ohio it is the state's high court, an interesting comparison to Cuyahoga County where Democrats usually win and only 10 percent of registered voters are Republican. Brown did not even win in his native county of Cuyahoga County, which includes Cleveland and is Ohio's largest, and he lost in Franklin County too, where he currently lives and serves as chief justice, a signature outcome that explains his overall defeat statewide on Tuesday. And a defeat it was, as O'Connor walked away with 68 percent of the vote.
Now why is O'Connor's win better for the Black community? I must first explain that an all Republican and all White Ohio Supreme Court is bad for everybody where the absence of diversity even relative to partisan politics simply does not yield a Democratic process that Ohioans can be proud of. Big business usually wins when Republicans are in control in Washington, and on all levels of the political continuum. That is not good for the Black community anyway you cut it, though Ohio's high court decision this decade that branded its system of funding public education partially through property taxes unconstitutional because it discriminates against poor school districts, some predominantly Black like Cleveland, is a departure from its typical conservative decisions . Still, poor children, years later, await a constitutional revision that is not anti-Black, anti-poor people and anti-Democratic.
O'Connor is better suited to push for compliance with her court's mandate for the Ohio State Legislature to constututionally revise the state's system of funding public education to help poor children than the Democrat Brown, who backed Strickland's bandaid approach to the public school funding issue. That approach, to the detriment of poor Black and other children, provides for the phasing of projects over the next 10 years to expand monies for poor school districts with an ongoing forum for property rich school districts to still collect taxes to keep the process unconstitutional for poor kids.
Given that Ohio is simply going to have an all Republican court for now and had Brown won, an overwhelmingly Republican court, O'Connor was the best choice. Brown alone could not influence majority decisions of the seven-member Ohio Supreme Court with any vigor, and his Republican colleagues did not like him as a whole as he came aboard crying that Democrats need to be represented on the state's high court bench when voters had said no to them over and over and over.
The role of the chief justice is powerful and Brown was abusing his short term power. In addition to the power to appoint lawyers, judges and others to grievance and other committees, and a host of other activities, the chief justice assigns visiting judges to cases where county common pleas judges are disqualified from hearing them via an affidavit of prejudice by a complaining party for conflict or bias. And the assigned judge is usually a retired judge, in violation of the mandatory retirement age of 70 that Ohio's constitution dictates, though here state law conflicts with the retirement age mandate outlined in Ohio's constitution.
But state law does not permit in any way the assignment by the chief justice of visiting judges to replace municipal court judges disqualified via conflict or bias from hearing a case and mandates a sitting judge from the county selected by that county's presiding judge of the court of common pleas, where felony and other cases are heard. Like the recently deceased Moyer, Brown was usurping the role of Ohio's common pleas court presiding judges and assigning visiting judges to hear cases where an Ohio municipal court judge from Cleveland, Berea, Lyndhurst and elsewhere would disqualify him or herself due to conflict or bias. Brown would often assign a visiting judge from a far away city who was either retired or no longer a judge and that person would cost excess tax dollars to travel throughout the state, coupled with sometimes coming to town, violating the law, and running back home without consequences from voters or otherwise. And Blacks and the little people would be disproportionately impacted by the biased visiting judge process, often being forced to endure judicial abuse.
O'Connor now has the power to make changes to the court system that reflect a commitment to the fair administration of justice and an assignment process to replace municipal court judges subject to disqualification that does not disenfranchise the community and that complies with state law and Ohio's Rules of Superintendence, namely Ohio Revised Code 2701.031 and Rule 17 of the Rules of Superintendence. The chief justice elect said while campaigning that she would make sweeping changes, including a recommendation for panels to make accepted recommendations for the appointment of judges by Ohio's governors, a change that would require a change in the current state law on the matter.
For clarification, other judges like the chief justice or a presiding judge of a court of common pleas assign judges to cases as visiting judges when sitting judges are disqualified or cannot serve temporarily. On the other hand, the governor, by state law, appoints judges to replace judges that can no longer serve due to a seat open when a judge is elected to another court or via the inability for an elected sitting judge to serve for 90 days or more, and those such appointed judges must seek election thereafter to retain the seat.
O'Connor says she wants a panel to make recommendations as to the appointment of judges by the governor. We hope she still feels this way since Republican John Kasich is the governor elect and we hope that Justice O'Connor will push for the selection of judges via a random draw judicial pool when they are disqualified from hearing cases at all levels beginning with Ohio's municipal courts. No single judge, whether it is a presiding judge of a common pleas court or the chief justice of the Ohio Supreme Court, should have the sole power to assign judges where absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Neither Blacks nor others can stand an assignment process of visiting judges in municipal and commmon pleas court cases that is manipulated by special interests and if the judges serving in Ohio's highest court are reluctant to fair play in this arena, the damage transcends the Black community and reaches far beyond our imaginations. Congratulations to the chief justice elect.
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