How Digital Recorders Will Improve Access to Justice

Like other courts across the nation, Cook County is seeing increasing numbers of self-represented parties in the courts. At the same time that litigants are finding it harder to pay for legal services, Cook County has a projected budget deficit of $152 million for 2014, which has resulted in a reduc...
May 28, 2015

The Daily Law Bulletin Covers Judicial Elections in their Law Day Issue

The Chicago Daily Law Bulletin examined the issue of money in judicial elections in their annual Law Day issue last Sunday, April 26th. Staff Attorney Elizabeth Monkus was among the people interviewed for the article, which was framed around the Williams-Yulee case, which was still pending in the Su...
May 11, 2015

Chicago Sun-Times Editorial Supporting Field Testing Bill

  Today the Chicago Sun-Times issued an editorial in support of the Field Drug Testing Pilot Bill that Chicago Appleseed was instrumental in developing. The editorial can be found here and previous entries on our blog describing the issue can be found here.  The current version of the bill HB3...
May 5, 2015

SCOTUS Ruling on Judicial Campaign Ethics Rules

Chicago Appleseed and the Chicago Council of Lawyers were invited to join an amicus brief filed in Williams-Yulee v. the Florida Bar, examining whether a rule of judicial conduct that prohibits candidates for judicial office from personally soliciting campaign funds violates the First Amendment. The...
April 29, 2015

Child Support Enforcement and the Function of Family Courts

This week, the New York Times published a story about how the child support enforcement systems and policies in U.S. court create a cycle of non-payment by middle and low income parents: Skip Child Support. Go to Jail. Lose Job. Repeat. Unpaid child support became a big concern in the 1980s and ’90s...
April 22, 2015