High court in a grand room

Returning to its roots, the Ozaukee County Board meeting room in the historic downtown Port Washington courthouse was once again used as a courtroom Friday, and this time by the highest court in the state.

“This is a spectacular old courthouse and such an incredible courtroom,” Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Annette Ziegler told an audience of schoolchildren, parents, lawyers and officials, referring to the boardroom that decades ago served as a county courtroom and has since been restored to its original splendor.

“I think we have more room here than we do in our hearing room at the state Capitol.”

Ziegler’s comments came during the court’s Friday, Oct. 15, visit to Port Washington as part of its Justice on Wheels program designed to give the public, in particular students, the opportunity to see the court at work.

“Everyone should have a working knowledge of how our system works and how our courts operate, and the best way to do that is to see it working firsthand,” Ozaukee County Circuit Judge Sandy Williams said in welcoming the justices to Port Washington. “We are so blessed to have this chance, and I am forever grateful that our students have this opportunity to observe our highest court.”

Ziegler said, “We want people to understand the role of the court and the work we do.”

The justices heard arguments in two cases, but perhaps more interesting to the students in attendance was a history lesson by Ziegler that focused on two Ozaukee County cases decided by a fledgling Wisconsin Supreme Court — one that dealt with the 1862 Port Washington draft riot and another to which Ozaukee County owes its existence.

Noting Ozaukee County was created the same year as the Wisconsin Supreme Court was established as a stand-alone court in 1853, Ziegler said, “As it turns out, Ozaukee County kept the Supreme Court fairly busy in those early years.”

On Nov. 11, 1862, Nicholas Kemp and a mob destroyed a federal Civil War draft headquarters in Port, preventing the draft from taking place. The mob stoned federal officials and rioted in the streets, leaving a path of destruction. 

Two days later, Kemp was arrested under an order from President Abraham Lincoln and imprisoned at Camp Randall in Madison. 

On Dec. 4 of that year, the Wisconsin Supreme Court issued a writ of habeas corpus — an order to bring a person under arrest before a court to determine if the person is being legally held — compelling the military to produce Kemp for a Dec. 16 court hearing. 

The military did not comply with the order, leaving the court to decide whether the president had the authority to suspend habeas corpus, whether martial law applied in Wisconsin and whether the president had the unilateral power to change law. 

The court ruled that Kemp’s “riotous behavior,” if proven, violated state law and was a criminal matter, making his military imprisonment illegal. Ultimately the court determined Lincoln did not have any special wartime powers.

Interestingly, Kemp was represented by attorney Edward Ryan, who later became a Wisconsin Supreme Court justice and chief justice. 

Nearly a decade earlier, a court decision settled an eight-year dispute — “recognized as one of the most protracted battles ever over a county seat anywhere,” Ziegler said — and officially put Ozaukee County on the map.

In 1836, when Wisconsin became a territory, Port Washington was known as Wisconsin City and served as the county seat of Washington County, which encompassed all of what is now Washington and Ozaukee counties.

But by the 1840s, Port’s population and influence had diminished, and a battle over the county seat designation ensued. For periods of time, county business was conducted in a Grafton schoolhouse, private homes in Mequon and Hartford and a tavern in West Bend.

Ultimately, the state Legislature approved a plan proposed by an alliance of West Bend and Port Washington residents that called for splitting Washington County in two and declaring West Bend the county seat of the former and Port Washington the seat of the newly created Ozaukee County.

That only sparked more protests, and a judge who refused to hold court in West Bend sparked intervention by the Supreme Court. 

The question before the court essentially was whether Washington County was large enough to divide. The court ruled it was because its eastern boundary extended to the middle of Lake Michigan.

“I told you this story had a happy ending,” Ziegler said, noting she is from Washington County.