Kelly's voter rolls' case recusal stirs up earlier voting rights memory

Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Daniel Kelly - - a Walker appointee who will be on the ballot next year - - has recused himself from hearing the appeal of a judge's recent order to delete 234,000 names from election rolls.



I remember that Kelly played a roll in a Federal redistricting case as an attorney for GOP gerrymandering legislators several years ago, as I noted at the time on this blog:

When the case went to trial last month, lawyers for the state argued that the redistricting plan was the state's domain, according to the AP on February 24th:

Daniel Kelly, an attorney who defended the maps, said they were prepared as they should have been - by lawmakers. He said the Legislature's decision should be respected, not interfered with by the courts

"Drafting them is the province of the Legislature. It's a political act," he said. "This is their judgment, and it is inappropriate for a small group of people to attempt to reverse a legitimate politic, you know what happened...." 

Well, you know what happened. The Federal court agreed to hear the case and issued a decision a few weeks later that slammed the secrecy with which the redistricting was handled and ordered that [two] districts be mapped to comply with the US Voting Rights Act.

To which the state responded Friday by saying to the three-judge panel - - hey, you folks can go ahead and do our job for us because our Legislature won't.