CRIMINALIZING SPEECH
The headline for James Krohe Jr.’s editorial in the Aug. 27 Illinois Times reads “Aggressive behavior.” The sub-header reads “Will the high court leave Americans vulnerable to corporate panhandling?”
This suggests that the Springfield panhandling case, Norton, et al. v. City of Springfield, is about hectoring, threatening beggars. Nothing could be further from the truth. The case is not about aggressive panhandling. Nobody defends aggressive panhandling, and the Springfield ordinance protects citizens from it. This law is about criminalizing the speech of the poor and powerless. This may make good politics – after all, it is true that panhandlers are a despised minority – but it flies in the face of our society’s commitment to equal justice for all.
Barb Olson
Springfield
A NEW LOW
(Correction: This letter has been updated from a previous version containing an error.)
The Illinois Times cartoon showing attorney and former Alderman Sam Cahnman working from a stinking garbage can was a new low for its cartoonist, a case of indictment in the court of public opinion. (“This Week”, Chris Britt, Sept. 3)
Mr. Cahnman, a capable attorney and incorruptible public servant, has had a target on his chest since he espoused the open primary which is purposed with enabling Illinois citizens to vote in primary elections without declaring any party affiliation. He ran two times, unsuccessfully, for state representative on this issue, and Illinois would be much better off had he been elected.
In Mr. Cahnman’s latest go-round with the Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission (ARDC), he was charged with a conflict of interest for representing Mr. Calvin Christian in unrelated traffic cases while Mr. Christian was suing the city and Mr. Cahnman was a city alderman. Contradicting itself, the commission found that Mr. Cahnman had no conflict of interest on two counts of the charges against him, but then flipped on the third
count and found that while he didn't have a conflict, he still should
have taken the initiative to tell the Council he represented Christian
on the traffic ticket. Note that Mr. Cahnman broke no law nor did he
violate any specific rule that said he had to tell the Council.
Mr. Christian's 2013 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit alleged that Springfield police destroyed internal affairs records while Mr. Christian had a pending FOIA request for those records. The city settled the suit for about $100,000 with Mr. Christian and his attorneys. Mr. Cahnman did not represent Mr. Christian in this or another FOIA suit.
It is ironic that after the egregious conduct in the city deliberately shredding files after an effort to obtain them by a legal FOIA request, the only person being punished is attorney Sam Cahnman.
Douglas K. Turner
Springfield
Correction: The editorial staff originally ran a previous version of this letter which stated that Mr. Cahnman had no conflict of interest on one count, not two. We apologize for our mistake.
2014 ELECTION RESULTS
Registered voters in Illinois: 7,483,031. Number who voted in the November 2014 election: 3,680,417. Number who voted for Rauner: 1,823,167 – 50 percent. Number who voted for Quinn: 1,687,343 – 46 percent. Three percent of the total vote went to a third party candidate. This means Rauner won by 142,824 votes. That is about the number of people in Peoria.
The question put to the public about raising the billionaires’ tax by 3 percent got 3,669,000 yes votes – 63 percent of the total votes. What this shows is that Rauner clearly does not have a mandate in Illinois; however, he pretends to want to ask voters about raising taxes. The voters spoke. We elected, by a slim margin, a governor, not a king.
Rauner needs to wake up or go. You can find these results by going to the Illinois State Board of Elections website at elections.il.gov.
Nancy Summers-Long
Springfield
