Change Ahead?

It appears that in addition to the presidency, the future structure of Cincinnati municipal government may be at stake in the 2008 election. The Enquirer reported Friday that the executive board of the Cincinnati branch of the NAACP has decided to have its full membership vote (this Friday) on whether to attempt to change the City Charter to require Council to be elected through "proportional representation." How does "PR" work? Essentially, voters would be given a ballot on which they would rank their choices for Council. For an explanation of how votes are counted under the system, go to this website and scroll down to "Single Transferable Vote or Choice Voting."

The city actually used the system from the 1920's through the 1950's. According to this history of PR, the end of the system in 1957 was fueled by fairly nasty, racist motives:

In Cincinnati, race was the dominant theme in the successful 1957 repeal effort. The single transferable vote had allowed African Americans to be elected for the first time, with two blacks being elected to the city council in the 1950s. The nation was also seeing the first stirrings of the Civil Rights movement and racial tensions were running high. PR opponents shrewdly decided to make race an explicit factor in their repeal campaign. They warned whites that PR was helping to increase black power in the city and asked them whether they wanted a "Negro mayor." Their appeal to white anxieties succeeded, with whites supporting repeal by a two to one margin.

In the same article (almost as an aside, despite its seeming importance), the Enquirer reports that Jeff Berding plans to ask Council to approve another Charter amendment for the November ballot. His proposal would implement the 2004 Election Reform Commission's recommendation (scroll to page 9 for the pertinent discussion) that Cincinnati move to a true "strong mayor" system of government. As noted in the linked document, under Berding's proposal, the Mayor--not the City Manager--would appoint administrative officers and department heads, like the City Solicitor, the Directors of Finance and Public Utilities, and the Superintendent of Water Works. The City Manager would be replaced by a "Chief Administrative Officer" who would serve at the pleasure of the Mayor (Council's advice and consent would not be required for appointment or removal) and have only so much power as the Mayor chose to delegate to ensure the day-to-day operations of the City. And the Mayor would no longer have a role in City Council (instead, Council would elect its own President, equivalent to the Speaker of the House in Congress, and select its own committee chairs).

Intrepid Cincinnati Blog readers will remember that we had a discussion about these issues earlier this year (here and here). If either or both of these proposals makes it to the ballot, I anticipate that we'll discuss it a lot more. But these are huge changes in the way City government would be elected and operate. If they're on the ballot, I hope we have a broad, City-wide discussion that isn't completely drowned out by the presidential and county-wide elections.

Obama's Cincinnati Connections

Today's New York Times contains an excellent profile of Michelle Obama. Quoted in the article, albeit briefly, is University of Cincinnati College of Law Professor Verna Williams.

As Cincinnati Magazine has previously reported, Professor Williams attended Harvard Law School with Ms. Obama. Her husband, David Singleton, the executive director of the Ohio Justice and Policy Center, was a classmate of Barack Obama at HLS.

The Obamas' ties to the local legal couple is old news, certainly. But now that Senator Obama is the Democrats' "presumptive" nominee, it's interesting to speculate as to who might be part of an Obama presidential administration (especially in light of today's news that the Illinois senator has a six-point lead in Ohio over the Republicans' "presumptive" nominee, Senator McCain). Add to the mix that Mr. Singleton and Professor Williams are each highly distinguished in the legal field--we've previously reported on his litigation successes (his pre-OJPC career is equally impressive), while she's a widely respected, well-accomplished legal academician--and speculation turns into outright daydreaming. How about a Supreme Court Justice Williams? Or a Solicitor General (or Attorney General) Singleton?

Just some food for thought on an otherwise slow day.

Schmidt Spreading Lies

Yet another example of Jean Schmidt willing to scare voters with the lies of the GOP machine.

Gay Pride 2008

A beautiful day and a fun gathering of a great variety of people who live in our little town. I do think it is time the parade and festival moved downtown to Fountain Square or Sawyer Point. Cincinnati needs a Sunday afternoon convergence of Reds fans, opera fans, churchgoers, lesbian and gay couples with babies, drag queens and kings, and a few beautiful transgendered women that you straight guys out there unknowingly keep trying to pick up at the bar on Saturday night before you head to Crossroads or the Vineyard Sunday morning (both could be great worship spaces if not for being anti-gay -- ask your pastor before you yell at me and tell me I am wrong) --- you and I both know who you straight boys are.

Fountain Square in the Morning

Gone But Not Forgotten: Uncle Woody's

Via an email from a friend earlier this week, I read a rumor (or at least what I was hoping was just a rumor) that Uncle Woody's in Clifton had closed. I drove past the establishment a couple nights ago and can now confirm that Uncle Woody's is no more. The sign on the front has been taken down. In 1999, CityBeat profiled the bar and its owner, Buzzy.

Uncle Woody's is (was, *sigh*) right across the street from the UC College of Law (my alma mater), so on any given night you could find a bunch of procrastinating law students tipping back a few. The bar is so much a part of law school culture that Buzzy and his staff annually picked a list of graduates to be on its "Bar Review." The students got their names engraved on a plaque that hangs permanently inside; the award was more coveted than selection to UC's Law Review (an academic publication) or moot court. When I was a law student, we generally considered the place "our bar."

Uncle Woody's was born the same year I was (1974), and most of us thought it would be there forever. Generations of law students have fond memories of heading over there for drinks after (or sometimes instead of) class. (And after the last final exam of the semester. Always. For many, many drinks.) The Moot Court Board, as an enticement to alums for judging its competitions, hosted an after-event happy hour at Uncle Woody's; on those nights, the bar would be packed with graduates reconnecting and reminiscing.

I've been skeptical of claims that Ohio's smoking ban would hurt Ohio's bar business, but I wonder if Uncle Woody's might be one of the few actual casualties of the ban. Christy's, about a block away and also frequented by UC students, has a large, outdoor courtyard where smoking remains permissible; it's possible patronage shifted there and away from the mostly indoors Uncle Woody's.

Uncle Woody's, ye shall be missed.

On The Docket: Bush Administration Has Again Exceeded Its Constitutional Authority

In a 5-4 ruling today, the Supreme Court held that Congress is without power to suspend the writ of habeas corpus for individuals being held at the detention facility in Guantanamo Bay. The Bush administration argued that trial by military commissions, as authorized by the Detainee Treatment Act and the Military Commission Act is an adequate substitute for habeas. The Supreme Court, in rejecting this position, has paved the way for Camp X-Ray prisoners to have their cases heard in federal courts.

Justice Kennedy wrote the decision of the Court, authoring an opinion that traces the history of the "Great Writ" back to Magna Carta. Here's a snippet:

The Framers viewed freedom from unlawful restraint as a fundamental precept of liberty, and they understood the writ of habeas corpus as a vital instrument to secure that freedom. Experience taught, however, that the commonlaw writ all too often had been insufficient to guard against the abuse of monarchial power. That history counseled the necessity for specific language in the Constitution to secure the writ and ensure its place in our legal system.
* * *
The Framers’ inherent distrust of governmental power was the driving force behind the constitutional plan that allocated powers among three independent branches. This design serves not only to make Government accountable but also to secure individual liberty. Because the Constitution’s separation-of-powers structure, like the substantive guarantees of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments, protects persons as well as citizens, foreign nationals who have the privilege of litigating in our courts can seek to enforce separation-of-powers principles.
(internal citations omitted.)

Let's just remember that this isn't the liberal, liberty-loving court of the 1950's and '60's. And as the Times reports, it's yet another "harsh rebuke of the Bush administration."