By: Mark Glennon*
There’s something uniquely pleasing in just the caption of a lawsuit filed Wednesday by Judge James R. Brown. It’s that Illinois Supreme Court justices are named personally as defendants.
Brown, as we wrote earlier this month, was politically assassinated. The retired Illinois judge had been temporarily reinstated last year to fill a vacancy on the bench. But when two left wing organizations complained this year about a column he had written while retired, the Illinois Supreme Court unceremoniously rescinded his reinstatement. Brown’s column was fully within his First Amendment rights and it was, in many ways, unremarkable. It condemned recent examples of “lawfare” — misuse of the courts for political and social goals — and celebrated how the misuse is being rolled back.
But Brown’s lawfare column was about abuse of legal process by the left against the right, which triggers the left’s cancel mob. What tool did the mob proceed to use? Lawfare, ironically.
The two left wing organizations wrote to the Illinois Supreme Court demanding his termination. The top Illinois judges obliged. The Democratic-controlled court threw Brown off the bench on Jan. 26 in a one-sentence order. Brown was accorded no hearing, notice or chance for rebuttal of any kind. That added procedural due process violations to the free speech infractions the court was making. See our earlier column for more background.
Brown has now sued in federal court alleging those constitutional violations. The defendants are the justices. That’s appropriate because it was they who lowered the axe on Brown. Brown’s complaint is specific about why the justices should not be immune. To be protected from personal liability by judicial immunity, judges must have acted within their judicial capacity, the complaint says. But in this case, it says, “The individual Defendant Illinois Supreme Court justices acted outside their judicial capacity by unilaterally removing Judge Brown from the Cook County Circuit.” The Illinois Constitution strictly limits how sitting judges may be removed—only through impeachment or after notice and a public hearing by the Illinois Courts Commission.
Details on the lawsuit are provided here by the Liberty Justice Center, which is representing Brown. The complaint requests the federal court to issue injunctions that would reinstate brown and to award monetary damages.
Make no mistake about what happened here: Justices on lllinois’ top court ran a Star Chamber. They personally comprised a cancel mob and acted in blatant disregard of constitutional rights to due process and free speech. We can only hope they lose the lawsuit with maximum humiliation.
*Mark Glennon is founder of Wirepoints.
With $162 billion more from taxpayers, couldn’t you deliver a few bond upgrades, too
Audio and summary 
A largely unasked question is becoming glaring: Is Illinois doing all it should to use artificial intelligence to make government cost less and work better? So far, the evidence says no.
Good for Brown. The real story is Brown busily exposing the Soros-funded/City of London(COL) and their embedded pro-globalists minions on its payroll. Unmistakably, the Illinois Supreme Court Justices obeyed their masters to remove Brown. Then we have the Chicago Council of Lawyers and the Cook County Bar Association on the COL payroll demanding Brown’s termination. Soros is the face for COL and their mission is the current adversarial controlled demolition within the USA and other nations. Read The Shadowy Hand Behind Black Wednesday: Could George Soros be MI6’s Deniable Billionaire Proxy? How Britain’s “Folly” in 1992, May Have Secretly Funded… Read more »
Crooked Democrat judges on the IL Supreme court?
Perish the thought.
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We were talking about state-sponsored home equity theft/RICO a few weeks ago, and I recommended “making a federal case out of it”, and avoiding state court. Most cases involve due process violations and can be framed as a deprivation of rights case suitable for federal court. The plaintiff has the right to choose the venue, state or federal. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
Judge Neville received 2 homeowners exemptions.1 for his property& another for a property he claimed as his main residence.Fritz Kaegi the cook county assessors office knew about it for years.
Would one of those be the “ Home Alone “ resembling house that was assessed as a garage? Maybe they removed their toilets? I remember someone else using that tactic.
Cleaning up corrupted IL courts one lawsuit at a time. Sadly, it’s all the Democrat mob understands.
Good for you Judge Brown!! It’d be wonderful to see a victory here (for you and IL citizens)!
I hope he wins. This was a blatant misuse of power with no legal support for their actions.
Kudos to Judge Brown for the backbone to stick up for himself and for we citizens. The leftist and Democratic rot in Illinois needs to be met with the same “resistance” they so wrongly appropriate for their own authoritarian rule. We’ll see if there is any common sense within the Federal judiciary, but we cannot let these villains maintain their Orwellian control over us.
The word “Supreme ” no longer applies here. What a sad, terrible state of affairs here.
Fantastic job, Judge Brown, Mr. Glenon, and others, holding people accountable. #KeepItUp !