Maura Corrigan
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Maura D. Corrigan is a justice on the Michigan Supreme Court. Justice Corrigan was first elected to the Michigan Supreme Court in 1998 and reelected in 2006. She has served two terms as Chief Justice of the court, from 1997-1998 and again from 2001-2004. She was nominated to the court as a Republican.
In 2005, she garnered national attention as a potential U.S. Supreme Court nominee under the George W. Bush administration.[1]
Corrigan graduated from Marygrove College in 1969 and from the University of Detroit-Mercy School of Law in 1973.
She later served as a law clerk to Michigan Court of Appeals Judge John Gillis and became a Wayne County Assistant Prosecutor in 1974. In 1979, she became an Assistant United States Attorney, serving as Chief of Appeals and later Chief Assistant United States Attorney. In 1989, Justice Corrigan became a partner at the Detroit law firm of Plunkett & Cooney. In 1992, Governor John Engler appointed her to the Michigan Court of Appeals where she served seven years.
Awards and civic activities
Justice Corrigan participates in various community and professional activities. She is a past-President of the American Inns of Court at MSU-DCL Law School, and a member of the Pew Commission investigating foster care issues in the U.S. She served as vice-president of the Conference of Chief Justices, a member of the Michigan Law Revision Commission, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit Attorney Advisory Committee, and the Local Rules Committee of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan. She held posts on the Executive Board of the Michigan Judges Association and the Judicial Advisory Board of the Center for Law and Organizational Economics at the University of Kansas Law School. She also served on the board of Boysville of Michigan (now Holy Cross). She currently serves on the Board of Vista Maria. She is a long time member of the Federalist Society, Michigan Lawyers Chapter, and was president of the Incorporated Society of Irish American Lawyers and the Federal Bar Association, Detroit Chapter.
Justice Corrigan has won numerous awards for her achievements including: Spectrum Human Services, Inc. Chairman’s Award (2006); Michigan Family Support Council 2006 Judicial Award (2006); Police Officers Association of Michigan Jurist of the Year Award (2006); Incorporated Society of Irish American Lawyers’ Tiger Thornton Award (2006); Vista Maria’s Child Advocate of the Year Award (2005), the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute’s Angels in Adoption Award (2005), the Detroit News Michiganian of the Year Award (2005), the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (OCS) Award for significant improvements to Michigan's Child Support Enforcement Program (2002), the Federal Bar Association's Leonard Gilman Award to the Outstanding Practitioner of Criminal Law (1989), and the U.S. Department of Justice Director's Award for Outstanding Performance as an Assistant U.S. Attorney (1985). She holds honorary doctorates from five Michigan colleges and universities: Eastern Michigan University, Michigan State University/Detroit College of Law, Northern Michigan University, University of Detroit-Mercy, and Schoolcraft College. She has been chosen as the Outstanding Alumna of UD-Mercy Law School and Marygrove College. She has coauthored a treatise on civil procedure and has published articles in professional journals and books, including the Wayne Law Review, University of Toledo Law Review, NYU Law Review and the Texas Review of Law and Politics. She has taught as an adjunct professor at Wayne State University Law School and at programs of the Michigan Judicial Institute, the American Bar Association Appellate Practice Institute, the Federal Bar Association, and the U.S. Department of Justice Attorney General's Advocacy Institute.[2]
Judicial philosophy
In a forum sponsored by the Eastside Republican Club prior to the November 7, 2006 general election, Corrigan commented on Michigan's current economic reality. She said, “All of us understand what a mess Michigan is in right now.” Further, “Though Michigan is suffering a single-state recession and there is much finger pointing,” she said, “you don't have to be worried about the Michigan Supreme Court.” She said that according to the Wall Street Journal, Michigan has been referred to as “the finest Supreme Court in the nation.” Corrigan also noted the Washington Examiner listed the Michigan high court as a “judicial point of light” in contrast to what it described as “judicial hellholes around the country.” The Supreme Court Justice said she is proud of the work that has been accomplished in the last seven years. She said the court has been “restored to the Constitutional scheme the founders of our country intended, and that our [Michigan] Constitution requires.” Our constitutional government's greatest threat, she said, has been “Judges who do not understand the limits of their power.” She added, “When judges exceed their power, they threaten your rights of self government.” Corrigan declared, “That is not happening in Michigan!” Corrigan promised, “We will follow and apply the language of the law.” She reported that a recent study showed Michigan's litigation environment has improved, as its rank has moved up from 29th to 22nd among the 50 states. But considering neighboring Indiana is ranked in the top five, Corrigan said that Michigan's rank is still not good enough to make Michigan competitive.[3]
Notable rulings
Habitual offenders
In July of 2008, a 4-to-3 decision of the Michigan Supreme Court ruled that criminals can be sentenced as habitual offenders if their felonies stem from the same criminal act. "Michigan's habitual offender laws clearly contemplate counting each prior felony conviction separately," wrote Justice Maura Corrigan, who was joined by Clifford Taylor, Stephen Markman and Robert Young. The majority voted to overrule two cases in which the court said "convictions arising from one criminal incident shouldn't be counted more than once to give defendants habitual offender status." Dissenting Justices Michael Cavanagh and Marilyn Kelly wrote that the Legislature created the law to give harsher sentences to continual criminals. "When there are two plausible meanings, the more lenient should apply when years of a person's life are at stake," Cavanagh said. "The majority isolates a statute outside its clear statutory scheme to arrive at the harsher result." Justice Elizabeth Weaver agreed with the result of the decision but didn't join the majority's reasoning.[4]
City layoffs
In July of 2008, Justice Cavanagh dissented from the Supreme Court's ruling that an injunction by the Oakland County Circuit Court to stop layoffs of Pontiac firefighters should not have been issued. According to The Oakland Press, the ruling was that the circuit court "abused its discretion by granting injunctive relief." Justices Robert Young, Jr., Maura Corrigan, Stephen Markman and Chief Justice Clifford Taylor voted against upholding the injunction. Justices Marilyn Jean Kelly and Elizabeth Weaver voted with Cavanagh to uphold the injunction.[5]
External links
- League of Women Voters: 2006 Voters Guide
- Michigan Supreme Court: Maura Corrigan
- Wikipedia: Maura D. Corrigan
- NationMaster: Maura Corrigan
- Blawg on Corrigan's potential nomination to US Supreme Court 2005
- Newsmeat: Political Donations by Maura Corrigan
- NNBD.com
- US News and World Report: Talk of Corrigan's Nomination
- Supreme Court judge has made life better for thousands of foster children
- Project Vote Smart
- Supreme Court unanimously supports public’s right to walk Great Lakes beaches
- Proposal to re-write Michigan Constitution aims at taking Republicans out of office
- League of Women Voters: Supreme Court Campaign 2006
- Eastside Republican Club
- My Fox Detroit
- Speech about inadmissable evidence not protected
References
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