Utah Supreme Court justices are Utahns of the Year

What can one say about a state in which the branch of government that is inherently the least democratic and most distant from the people is clearly the branch most committed to defending democratic values ​​and protecting the rights of the people people?

Except we are very lucky to have the Supreme Court of Utah.

Over the past year, the five members of the state’s highest court have repeatedly stood up for the democratic process and individual rights promised in the Utah Constitution.

These decisions were not only brave and fair, but also meaningful. Enough to earn them the Salt Lake Tribune’s 2024 Utahns of the Year award.

Every December since 1997, The Tribune has chosen a Utah newsmaker, a person, persons or institution that has had the greatest impact – for better or worse – on the state and its people

In decisions that were often unanimous, judges, all appointed by Republican governors and confirmed by the Republican supermajority in the Utah Senate, confronted the Republican ruling class and its efforts to silence the voice of the people Away.

Chief Justice Matthew B. Durrant, Associate Chief Justice John A. Pearce, Justice Diana Hagen, Justice Paige Petersen and Justice Jill M. Pohlman joined forces to defend the constitutional right of the people of Utah to reform their own government, and are derailed. At least temporarily, legislation tries to tempt us to limit our own rights.

They have also stood up for women’s rights, once blocking the state’s enforcement of the regressive ban on almost all abortions and again ruling that women who had accused a doctor of sexually abusing them had a legitimate right to to sue this doctor.

The ruling protecting women’s right to self-determination in Utah is not the final word on the matter. It merely upheld a lower court’s ruling that the state’s near-abortion ban — enacted in 2020 but pending the overturn of Roe v. Wade ruling was blocked by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2022 — should be invalidated, while abortion rights defenders seek to have the law invalidated because of the Utah Constitution’s individual rights guarantees.

Read more: Katharine Biele wins Salt Lake Tribune Readers’ Choice for 2024 Utahn of the Year

The matter is now back in Utah’s district courts, although there is little doubt that the state Supreme Court will hear the matter again, regardless of what those justices decide. There is reason to hope that our judges, unlike their federal cousins, will once again stand up for women’s rights.

That’s what they did when they ruled that 94 women who alleged sexual abuse by a Provo doctor could sue under the more accessible abuse statute rather than relying on the much more restrictive medical malpractice claim process.

Sexual assault is not a medical activity, whether malicious or otherwise, the court correctly held, and is not subject to the limited rules that apply to the practice of medicine.

The justices championed the integrity of our elections by quickly brushing aside state Rep. Phil Lyman’s baseless claims that his loss to Gov. Spencer Cox in the Republican primary should not count and that the court should take the extraordinary step of proclaiming Lyman pointed out the candidate.

The court also set a pattern this year of standing up for the right of all Utahns to run their own government, even if the people running that government don’t want to.

The Court takes seriously the provision of the Utah Constitution that states: “All political power shall vest in the people; and all free governments are based on their authority for their equal protection and benefit, and have the right to alter or reform their government when the public good requires.”

Specifically, the court stated that citizens’ initiatives that change the form of state government must be respected by the legislature.

The case involved the Legislature’s move to scrap the 2018 Better Boundaries Initiative, a voter-approved measure that called for an independent process for drawing legislative and congressional districts. A passed bill that would make the process deliberative and reserve the Legislature’s unfettered right to manipulate our electoral process was challenged by reform activists, and the Supreme Court rejected a request from lawmakers to cast aside the lawsuit.

The detailed question of whether Better Boundaries will endure is still ongoing. But the Supreme Court’s decision protecting the people’s right to reform their own government gives us hope for democracy in Utah.

This also applies to a related case in which the court rejected a proposed constitutional amendment that would have given the legislature back the right to overturn any referendum. The court correctly ruled that the legislature did not follow the constitutional process to place the measure on the ballot. Lawmakers also presented voters with terribly misleading language that gave the impression that the amendment would do the opposite of what it actually would.

After each of those rulings, legislative leaders issued statements excoriating the justices. House Speaker Mike Schultz and President Stuart Adams accused the court, among other things, of “wreaking chaos and striking at the heart of our republic.”

The truth is that it is the Legislature that is causing chaos, and that it is the justices of the Utah Supreme Court who stand up for our republic and do no more – and no less – than their basic constitutional duty of control and control To provide a counterbalance to preserve our democracy.

With that, the judges were named Utahns of the Year.

Previous Salt Lake Tribune Editorial picks for Utahns of the Year include: