ASUO President Emma Kallaway’s grievance response portrays every charge against her as moot, and says that even if the court finds that she did not fulfill her duties there is no precedent for kicking her out of office.
The response cites case 7 C.C. 2003/2004, in which then-President Maddie Melton was found to have not fulfilled her duty to fill vacant seats on the court within 30 days. According to Kallaway’s response (how does she have old con court rulings when they aren’t public anywhere?), the court ruled that removing a president would “defeat the spirit of the ASUO Constitution.” The more recent case of Beranek v. McLain offers more precedent for not removing a president on a grievance.
But since Melton was president before most current students — including Emma Kallaway — attended the University, let’s take a look back at her case.
Maddie Melton, a self-identified lesbian, was ASUO multicultural advocate when she ran for president. She had been a co-director of the LGBTQA and while running for president her home was vandalized in what she suspected to be a hate crime.
Her vice president Eddy Morales was charged with assault and criminal mischief for a September 12, 2003 incident — four months into their term in office — in which a student named Erica Hass said he assaulted her outside of Taylor’s Bar and Grill. According to an article published April 16, 2004 (that unfortunately cannot be found online for some reason), Hass “alleged that Morales pushed her down, dragged her several feet by her ankle and broke her cell phone” outside of Taylor’s. He was represented by ASUO Legal Services and later made a point of not voting on its budget.
Anyhow, the 2003-2004 Constitution Court apparently did not shy from activism. Justices took it upon themselves to redraw Academic Senate seats to make constituencies more even, and on February 4, 2004 they summoned Melton to a public hearing to explain why she had not filled the vacancies.
In what sounds rather unthinkable today, one seat on the court had been vacant from when Melton took office May 25, 2003 until mid-February when the court summoned her to do something about it.
Melton said she could not fill positions when there was no interest. (This was also McLain’s defense fours years later). The court, which had voted 2-to-1 to summon her, voted 2-to-1 to let her stay in office. Writing for the majority, Justice Stephen Yoshida called removing the president from office “a drastic remedy.”
Yoshida: “There can be no doubt that the ASUO president is required to appoint persons to vacant positions of the (constitution) court within thirty days of said vacancy. There is no requirement, however, that the ASUO president counteract student apathy.”
Though the court ordered Melton to fill the longest vacant position with “a qualified candidate” by Tuesday, February 24, Melton brought three nominees to Senate on Wednesday, February 25. According to an Emerald preview of the meeting they were former ASUO legislative intern and College Democrats President Randy Derrick; Andrea Hall, who was the elections coordinator when Melton was elected; and “former ASUO legislative associate” (whatever that means) Stefan Myers.
One article mentions that Justice Adam Petkun would soon need to be replaced because he was going to explore a bid for the presidency, which he eventually won. No articles between these appointments and the start of the spring election mention another court appointment.
Here are the relevant links:
Con Court summons Melton for inquiry
Melton defends hiring delays
Melton appoints students to Con Court
And just for fun, take a look at how little things change around here:
Senate agrees to reimburse USSA trip