The Illinois Supreme Court has shipped a group of lawsuits brought by restaurants challenging the authority of Gov. JB Pritzker to shut down their dining rooms and potentially put them out of business, to a Springfield judge who has sided with Pritzker so far on similar challenges.
On Nov. 17, the state’s high court issued an order consolidating 10 lawsuits brought by restaurant owners from Chicago’s suburbs and elsewhere in the state, before Judge Raylene Grischow in Sangamon County Circuit Court in Springfield.
The lawsuits included cases filed in Cook County, McHenry County, Kane County, DuPage County and DeKalb County, as well as downstate in Sangamon County, Clinton County and Marion County.
Sangamon County Judge Raylene Grischow
The order means the lawsuits will be handled together with nearly all other lawsuits brought across the state against Pritzker over the orders he has issued in the name of fighting the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The restaurant owners filed their lawsuits in a flurry this fall, in the wake of Pritzker’s actions to forbid indoor dining and drinking at restaurants and bars across the state. Pritzker has since expanded those orders to restrict a host of other activities, capping capacity in retail stores, for instance, and placing a "pause" on all organized youth sports, in new orders issued Nov. 17.
The lawsuits were in many ways similar to a host of other legal challenges that have landed in Illinois court rooms since Pritzker began governing by executive orders, as he invoked emergency powers to respond to the pandemic.
The lawsuits have all asserted Pritzker has overstepped his authority. They particularly have asserted Pritzker’s interpretation of state law is incorrect. They have argued neither the Illinois Emergency Management Agency Act nor the Illinois state constitution give Pritzker the authority to continue governing using emergency powers, open-ended, whether a pandemic continues or not.
They argued the governor must secure approval from the Illinois General Assembly to continue governing the state by such orders.
Pritzker and his fellow Democrat, Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul, have instead argued the governor has that authority under the state law, so long as the governor believes the pandemic that caused a statewide disaster continues, provided the governor re-declares the same disaster every 30 days.
Courts have almost unanimously sided with Pritzker on the question, saying they believe it does not matter if Pritzker’s orders result in economic devastation, causing many restaurants and other businesses to close their doors, never to reopen.
Judges in most of the restaurants’ lawsuits, for instance, have denied the restaurants’ request for restraining orders, which would have allowed them to continue operate as their lawsuits against Pritzker continued.
The restaurant owners said the inability to serve patron indoors, as wintry weather arrived, would doom their businesses.
Among the cases now consolidated before Judge Grischow in Springfield is the case brought by FoxFire Tavern, of Geneva. In that case, a Kane County judge had sided with the restaurant, issuing a temporary restraining order forbidding Pritzker and other officials from enforcing the governor’s shutdown order against FoxFire.
However, that restraining order was struck down by a state appeals court days later. In that decision, the state appeals panel, led by former DuPage County State’s Attorney Joseph Birkett, explicitly ruled there is no meaningful provision in the law imposing any kind of time restraint on Pritzker’s authority to govern by executive order after he has declared a statewide disaster.
Further, the appeals justices shied away from answering whether the courts have any role at all in reviewing the reasoning of the governor in imposing emergency economic and societal restrictions in response to a disaster – in this case, a pandemic.
FoxFire’s lawyers have indicated they will appeal that ruling to the Illinois Supreme Court. However, for now, the ruling has become legal precedent throughout the state, after the appeals panel granted the request of Pritzker and Raoul to “publish” the decision as an official opinion of the court.
Grischow also has recently sided with Pritzker several times, as she handles the legal challenges to Pritzker’s power assigned to her by the Illinois Supreme Court.
Grischow has also specifically cited the decision in the FoxFire case from the Second District Appellate Court.
Most recently, Grischow dismissed several cases from downstate counties, challenging Pritzker’s authority to require public schools to submit to health guidance dictated by the Illinois Department of Public Health.
In that decision issued from the bench, Judge Grischow ruled Pritzker had that authority during a “health crisis.” No written order has yet been issued in those cases. But Grischow directed the Attorney General’s office to draft an order in line with her judgment, and she would approve it in about two weeks, according to a docket entry from Sangamon County court.