Judge that ruled against NSA has history of ignoring the law

SUMMARY: It should come as no surprise that the judge who ruled against the NSA's wiretapping program has a history of ignoring the law when it suits her own person political agenda.

From Opinion and Order by Judge Bernard A. Friedman Denying Defendant's Motion to Designate Gratz v. Michigan and Grutter v. Michigan as Companion Cases, August 17, 1998...

Judges Feikens and Cook lacked authority for several reasons. First, their designation by the Chief Judge was unlawful. When Chief Judge Taylor disqualified herself, a federal statute required that she assign the portion of defendants' motion addressed to her to "the district judge in active service, present in the district and able and qualified to act, who is next in precedence." 28 U.S.C. § 136(e).4 If for whatever reason Chief Judge Taylor believed this statute did not apply, she might instead have elected to reassign the portion of defendants' motion addressed to her to another judge by blind draw pursuant to E.D. Mich. LR 83.11(d)(1). 5 This alternative procedure would at least have protected the appearance of fairness and impartiality. However, Chief Judge Taylor followed neither § 136(a) nor Local Rule 83.11(d)(1), but instead devised her own, novel procedure, whereby she reassigned the entire motion (not just the portion addressed to her) to two judges whom she personally selected to act as a special two-judge panel....

While Chief Judge Taylor recognized that she must disqualify herself pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 455,6 she nonetheless violated her legal and ethical duty by selecting the judicial officers who were to act in her stead....

By continuing to act after disqualifying herself, Chief Judge Taylor clearly violated § 455, and any action taken subsequent to her disqualification is a nullity. See id § 22.4.1 ("When a judge presumes to take substantive action in a case despite having recused himself from it ... any such action is often considered a nullity and any orders issued by such a judge are considered absolutely void for want of jurisdiction.")....

The court concludes that Chief Judge Taylor acted without authority when she reassigned both portions of defendants' motion to a hand-picked, two-judge panel. Because this two-judge panel was constituted unlawfully, it lacked any authority to convene, to hear argument, to issue any opinion or decision, or to take any action of any kind whatsoever in this case....

For these reasons, the court concludes that Chief Judge Taylor lacked authority to refer defendants' motion, or any portion thereof, to Judges Feikens and Cook; and that the August 6, 1998, "opinion" of Judges Feikens and Cook is unlawful, void and must be stricken.

You may recognize the name of the judge which ignored the law, as the same judge that just ruled that the NSA's wiretapping is "illegal". The cases involved white students objecting to minority students with lesser qualifications, being admitted to the two institutions, while they were rejected. Taylor happens to be married to University of Michigan Regent S. Martin Taylor, a defendant in both suits. But rather than just recusing herself, she violated the law and personally appointed two Liberal, pro-Affirmative Action judges to replace her, to assure a victory for the defendants.

Why she's still on the bench I don't know. Apparently judges can violate the law at will, and simply get away with it. Meanwhile she has the unmitigated gall to rule that the very practice that just saves the lives of who knows how many people by thwarting the planned bombing or airplanes enroute from the UK to here, unconstitutional.

Is this some sort of sick joke?

Written by contributor Jack Lewis.

Category: Constitutional Issues.