Update on Con Con ballot suit

The battle has moved into the Appellate Court, and may soon be moving directly to the Illinois Supreme Court, according to this update from Steve Merican.

According to the above linked post, on Merican's Illinois Appellate Lawyer blog, Merican has been retained by the individual plaintiffs in the ballot suit to file a motion to bypass the Appellate Court and proceed immediately to the Illinois Supreme Court.

Triggering the decision, according to Merican's blog, was an order from the First Appellate District on the plaintiff-appellants' motion for an expedited briefing schedule. The order, entered October 8, gave the government agency defendants until October 14 to respond to the motion and set hearing on the motion for October 15. Only then would the Appellate Court decide whether to expedite the case.

This is a whirlwind timetable in almost any case -- but, as persons following this case already know, state and local election officials were protesting to the trial court, before the end of September, that it was already too late to correct the ballot. At some point, and presumably at some point soon, even if that claim was once exaggerated, it must certainly become true. And yet, as Judge Howse ruled on October 1 that language framing the question for Illinois voters was "downright misleading" and unconstitutional.