Latest News - Chicago Appleseed Center for Fair Courts

Illinois Supreme Court Requires Judges to Self-Evaluate

This week, the Illinois Supreme Court announced that it had amended Illinois Supreme Court Rule 58, “Judicial Performance Evaluation.” The amendment mandates that all Circuit Court and Associate judges be evaluated through a process to be administered through a contract with National Center for Stat...

Judges Should Be Evaluated for Performance, Not Politics

This post originally appeared at the Huffington Post. When a judge is weighing the merits of a case, the popularity of her decision should be the last thing on her mind. And when casting a ballot for a judge, performance, not political issues, should be a voter’s first concern. Yet, outcome-based j...

An Introduction to Illinois Redistricting

The 2010 Census results are in, and the big news is that Illinois has grown a mere 3% in the last decade, while Chicago has shrunk by nearly 7%, or 200,000 people. The data indicates that black and Hispanic Chicagoans are migrating from the city to the suburbs, taking up residence in Chicago’s so-ca...

Diversion Division: A Remedy for Racially Disproportionate Drug Enforcement

This post originally appeared at the Huffington Post. In Illinois last week, a statutorily mandated, unbiased committee, the Disproportionate Justice Impact Study (DJIS) Commission, reported the latest evidence confirming a long-held suspicion -- that the war on drugs undermines African American...

Chicago Appleseed Promotes Community Schools in “Same Starting Line” Report

Today, Appleseed, Chicago Appleseed's national affiliate, released a major report that reveals significant resource disparities between high poverty schools and their middle and upper class counterparts. Entitled "The Same Starting Line: How School Boards Can Erase the Opportunity Gap Between Poor a...