Whenever mass murderers armed with assault weapons turn classrooms into crime scenes and school kids into corpses, we understandably seek out a villain. The National Rifle Association usually holds pride of place in our reactions, and deservedly so. The NRA’s commitment to a reckless, absolutist vision of the Second Amendment has prevented the adoption of […]
Author: Michael F. Roessler
Charlotte citizen. Husband. Lawyer. Dog dad. Book worm.
Charlotte’s politically respectable residents greeted Larken Egleston’s electoral defeat last month with stunned dismay. Larken, who has served on City Council since 2017 representing Plaza-Midwood, NoDa, Dilworth, and surrounding neighborhoods, finished fifth in this year’s six-way Democratic race to earn one of four at-large spots on the general-election ballot. While hoping to make the transition […]
The recently concluded race for Mecklenburg County district attorney reminded me of nothing so much as Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter From Birmingham Jail” — with the incumbent prosecutor and most of our community cast in the role of the go-slow clergy whom Dr. King criticized in his famous missive: We had a chance to […]
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Charlotte’s Very Own Authoritarians
A push is underway in the Queen City to advance a kinder, hipper slate of GOP candidates for municipal office. But underneath self-consciously cool, mostly millennial packaging lurks a tolerance for the authoritarianism that defines today’s Republican Party. The contenders themselves told us so. When candidate filing opened in March at the Mecklenburg County Board […]
While darkness has enveloped much of American politics since Donald Trump descended his escalator to announce a bid for the presidency, one bright spot has offered some hope that decency would yet prevail in politics and the public square: the work of so-called “never Trump” Republicans. Faced with a candidate and president plainly unfit for […]
Big businesses like to showcase their expertly curated pro-LGBTQ bona fides — and those of us who very much want to believe in right-thinking corporate benevolence take them at their word. Who can blame us? The acts of symbolic support are everywhere: Skyscrapers glow in celebration of gay liberation. Business logos take on rainbow hues […]
Local television news reporter Joe Bruno put it nicely. After disgraced former mayor and convicted crook Patrick Cannon filed this month to run for an at-large seat on Charlotte City Council, Mayor Vi Lyles released a statement responding to his attempted political comeback: “There are a number of at-large city council candidates. As long as […]
Odd as it sounds, I just can’t shake the memory of a recent Charlotte City Council meeting — and the lesson it teaches about our broken politics and bankrupt public ethics. At the meeting, which occurred in November 2021, Council considered two items: First, it voted to award $75 million in tax breaks and other […]
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Dan Bishop’s First Amendment Folly
A property dispute landed Messrs. Willis and Smith in the North Carolina courts in September 1789. The legal contest arose from Willis’s attempted purchase of land from the absent H.E. McCulloch, who had “carried … beyond the sea” the deed proving his ownership of the property. With the deed missing, how could Willis prove McCulloch […]
When hundreds of anti-choice zealots marched outside a health clinic last month, Charlotte’s noise ordinance limited the harassment and heckling they could heap on women seeking care. The city’s code prevented protesters from using amplified sound too close to the facility and cordoned off certain areas in front of the doctor’s office to create room […]
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