The Wisconsin Supreme Court normally sits in its main hearing room in the East Wing of the Wisconsin State Capitol building in Madison, Wisconsin. Since 1993, the court has also travelled, once or twice a year, to another part of the state to hear several cases as part of its "Justice on Wheels" program. The purpose of this program is to give the people of Wisconsin a better opportunity to understand the operations of the state supreme court and the court system.
Justices
The court is composed of seven justices who are elected in state-wide, non-partisan elections. Each justice is elected for a ten-year term, and only one justice may be elected in any year. In the event of a vacancy on the court, the governor has the power to appoint an individual to the vacancy, but that justice must then stand for election in the first year where no other justice's term expires.
The justice with the longest continuous service on the court serves as the chief justice, unless that justice declines, in which case the role passes to the next senior justice of the court. In such a case, the declining justice continues to serve as a justice on the court.
In the popular mystery novel The Westing Game, and its film adaptation, the character Josie-Jo "J.J." Ford is a judge on the Appellate Division of the Wisconsin Supreme Court. Five years after the end of the story it shows she becomes a judge on the United States Circuit Court of Appeals, and is later appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court. The novel, which takes place in the 1970s, states she was the first black and the first woman to be elected to a judgeship in the state.
