Plan To Be 100

1. The End of MCR 5.801(B)

The worst Court Rule ever, which requires some probate matters to be appealed to Circuit Court and some to the Court of Appeals, is about to be fixed. The Michigan House and Senate have passed legislation which would send all final orders of the probate court to the Court of Appeals.   The Governor is expected to sign.

Forever we have had a bizarrely complicated rule which required you to try and figure out what type of order you had, in order to figure out where you could appeal to. Worst of all, final orders appointing a conservator were appealed to the Court of Appeals, whereas final orders regarding the appointment of a guardian were appealed to the Circuit Court.  I, and I am sure many others, have had cases in which both guardianship and conservatorship actions were commenced, after which one action would be appealed to the Court of Appeals and one to the Circuit Court.  It made no sense.

2. California’s Assisted Suicide Law Takes Effect

Today is the day California’s citizens begin to have the right to legal assisted suicide. Until California joined the movement, only Oregon, Vermont and Washington had assisted suicide laws.  Montana allows assisted suicide based on case law.

California is obviously the big dog in this pack. One might speculate that the addition of California changes the dynamics, and may signal the beginning of a trend. How soon before public opinion shifts and we see these laws come to the Midwest? For the record, it has been 26 years since Michigan’s own Dr. Jack Kevorkian made this issue a mainstream topic.