In the many years of writing articles—and many socio-politically contrarian articles—only once did I receive “hate mail,” being during COVID, regarding my claim against then-Governor Wolf. [*]
But what makes my receiving the referenced “hate mail” even more interesting—if not perplexing—is that some came from my brethren lawyers, in the context of my defending the judiciary and “separation of powers“. Alas, it has been said that there is no good deed that goes unpunished…although I presume.
Lawyers can write great hate mail. One representative hate email—the non sequitur notwithstanding—was sublimely curt and straight-forward, saying, “You clearly want people to die.” Not true as to my intention, although it might be said that experience teaches that, for something to live, something must die. [1]
In any case, such as it is currently, national news about political branch in-fighting has caused me to refresh my perspective and to share this retrospective for posterity, perhaps for later reference by a young lawyer who may need to build upon a theme. If this happened once, it will happen again. It just takes time.
The year was 2020 and COVID was in full season.
I pressed “Submit” at the United States Supreme Court for an electronic filing: Zegarelli v. Wolf. (Friends later told me it was poetic irony, because I’ve written so many articles about Aesop’s Wolf.)
More precisely, the case was captioned as follows:
GREGG R. ZEGARELLI, PERSONALLY; GREGG R. ZEGARELLI, ESQ. AS OFFICER OF THE COURT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA; GREGG ZEGARELLI, ESQ. AS OFFICER OF THE COURT OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA,
Plaintiffs,
vs.
THOMAS W. WOLF; THE HONORABLE THOMAS W. WOLF, GOVERNOR OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA,
Defendants.
The document being filed was a Motion for Leave to File a Bill of Complaint. The complete Motion, with the exhibit “Defiance Letter” and “Demand Letter” available for download by clicking here. The legal basis for filing directly with the United States Supreme Court, rather than the lower court, is a matter of some legal depth, beyond the scope of this particular article.
On March 19, 2020, Thomas W. Wolf, Governor of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania issued Executive Order, 20200319 TWW COVID 19 (the “Order”), which said, in effect:
“Lawyers are non-essential workers and ordered by Governor Wolf not to work, except in very limited circumstances.”
This Order was jurisprudentially-politically-philosophically offensive, at least to me, being a lawyer. Not much offends me, but this was one of those things. [2.1] Therefore, I did what I thought any patriotic lawyer would do. [3]
Thusly began the causation for a Motion for Leave to File a Complaint directly with the United States Supreme Court, using an apparently novel and not tried before legal basis, pursuant to 28 USC §1251(2), stating, in part, as follows:
Thomas W. Wolf, as Governor of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, in his capacity of Governor, and in exceeding that capacity, personally, under designation of purported authority, has issued an Order to use his Executive Branch Officers (Commonwealth State Police) to arrest or otherwise incriminate Judicial Branch Officers (Attorneys) for the innocent practice of law, thereby depriving the People of their well-settled right of counsel, and impinging the People’s right to knowledge of the law that constrains their life, liberty and their pursuit of happiness within our American Constitutional Republic.
The circumstances of COVID-19 have caused, and continue to cause—and that or similar circumstances are likely to cause in the future—action by the respective Executive Branches of the several states, curtailing the freedoms of the People, within the framework of a “police state” being a “country in which the activities of the people are strictly controlled by the government with the help of a police force.” See, Merriam-Webster Dictionary, “police state”.
As licensed attorneys and Officers of the Court, we duly respectfully concede that the Executive Branch has, and should have, extreme power in emergencies and war. It is a principle of judicial restraint not to interfere with such actions for the greater good of the People, but the Executive Branch’s direct attack upon the Officers of the Judicial Branch, being both the Officers of the Federal Courts and Officers of the State Courts, with the threat of incriminating attorneys for the innocent practice of law, is a per se usurpation of power, and a repugnant violation of well-settled principles of “separations of powers.“
The Order places attorneys and citizens in immediate jeopardy of threat of arrest or other incrimination for the guaranteed unfettered right to receive legal counsel, and is thereby per se illegal.
Prior to the submission, I sent two letters to Governor Wolf. In retrospect, the letters had some notable assertions, quoted here, in part; to wit:
- The power to regulate is the power to destroy. There is no provision in the respective Constitutions that concedes check-and-balance power to the Executive to regulate the Judiciary whenever the Executive, in his or her absolute discretion, decides that there is an “emergency.” Any such provision makes the Executive superior to the Judicial and is thereby illegal, per se. Indeed, an emergency is a time when the unfettered right to obtain legal counsel is most essential.
- What is an “emergency” is subject to Executive whims, interpretations and abuse. This year’s COVID-19 is next year’s annual flu. If the Executive will do it this year for this purported reason, it will do it again next year for a new reason. Each reason further supports and justifies the next. We recall that Adolf Hitler gained power by Constitutional means, then taking away rights by increments.
- It is insidious to assert that a Judiciary closure of a court is the same as an Executive cease and desist to attorneys in the unfettered practice of law. Commanding attorneys to cease and desist the practice of law is an act of tyranny.
- Your latest qualification of the Order to bring some alignment to the judicial orders regarding court closures is sleight of hand, the vigilant will soon discover. The issue is not the part of the Order that you have conceded, but the part of the Order that you refuse to concede. The remaining portion of the Order that regulates judicial processes, commanding a cease and desist, remains illegal, per se.
- It is a flaw of practical reality conveniently to assume that all attorneys or all clients have the means to conduct themselves using virtual technologies. Some attorneys and some clients do not have that training, access or those means. Therefore, the Order forces clients to select new counsel based upon access to technology. This is a deprivation of equal protection of the laws.
- It is a flaw of logic to assume that, because an attorney refuses to concede Judicial power to the Executive, that it follows that the attorney is practicing irresponsibly or without prudent distancing. Attorneys are highly trained professionals and are best able to determine appropriate behavior in the context that best serves their clients.
- Even a purported noble cause is not an excuse for tyranny. King George, III, in all his high paternal presumption, also thought his cause was noble. Yet, our Founding Fathers determined that cause did not excuse the quartering of soldiers in our homes. It does not matter how kindly or innocently you present the Order, it is the Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing [4]; it is an experiment upon liberty as set forth in the Constitutions, and that experiment must fail, now, right now, before the new seed grows.
- The Executive Branch controls police and the militia. Using the militia or police to enforce the illegal and invalid Order is tyranny. Nevertheless, I am practicing law in open defiance of the Order and may be arrested for doing so at the Administrative Office set forth in this communication.
To state it in layperson terms: It is conceded that the Executive Branch of government has authority to use its police power in emergencies, and could perhaps command grocery stores, beauty parlors, and such things, but the one thing the Executive Branch does not have authority to command is the separate Judicial Branch.
Just think about it. If the Executive Branch could send out police troops and military to arrest attorneys for practicing law, citizens would not be able to get legal advice about the fact that they cannot get legal advice about the fact that the Executive Branch is arresting their legal counsel who would advise them that it is illegal for them not to have a right to their legal counsel. The system fails.
Gov. Wolf’s affront to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Constitution, Article V, was open, notorious and wanton, and violated, per se, the express principle set forth by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania; to wit:
Pursuant to our constitutional authority, this Court adopted the Rules … which govern the conduct and discipline of attorneys. Commonwealth v. Stern, 549 Pa. 505, 701 A.2d 568, 571 (1997). In Stern, this Court held a statute that criminalized the conduct of an attorney….was unconstitutional as violative of the separation of powers doctrine. Stern, 701 A.2d at 573. Pursuant to Pa.R.D.E. 103, “[t]he Supreme Court declares that it has inherent and exclusive power to supervise the conduct of attorneys who are its officers” and this Court is vested with “the inherent and exclusive power to govern the conduct of those privileged to practice law in this Commonwealth.” Wajert v. State Ethics Comm’n, 491 Pa. 255, 420 A.2d 439, 442 (1980). The General Assembly has no authority under the Pennsylvania Constitution to regulate the conduct of lawyers in the practice of law. Thus, we conclude … to regulate the conduct of attorneys and would be an impermissible encroachment upon the power of this Court. Beyers v. Richmond, 594 Pa. 654, 937 A.2d 1082 (2007); Article V, Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Constitution.
The United States Constitution, Article III, states: “The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court…,” which is a “check and balance” pursuant to principles of “separation of powers” long established by our Founding Fathers, as set forth in Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137 (1803) and its progeny, expressed, to wit:
It is equally evident, that the members of each department should be as little dependent as possible on those of the others, for the emoluments annexed to their offices. Were the executive magistrate, or the judges, not independent of the legislature in this particular, their independence in every other would be merely nominal. But the great security against a gradual concentration of the several powers in the same department, consists in giving to those who administer each department the necessary constitutional means and personal motives to resist encroachments of the others.
The provision for defense must in this, as in all other cases, be made commensurate to the danger of attack. Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. The interest of the man must be connected with the constitutional rights of the place. It may be a reflection on human nature, that such devices should be necessary to control the abuses of government. But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature?
If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.
The Federalist Papers : No. 51: The Structure of the Government Must Furnish the Proper Checks and Balances Between the Different Departments. February 8, 1788.
“Any scintilla of an Executive Order threatening to use State Police upon Judicial Officers (Attorneys) is repugnant to the United States Constitutional Republic and is illegal per se.“
But here’s the really important part of it all. Here is the lesson for every citizen, law student, professor of law, lawyer, and judge.
Forewarned is forearmed.
The lesson is to observe how people—even some lawyers—react in the presence of an emergency, and how the bandwagon of fear and public opinion press against systemic integrity perhaps to a point of failure.
Until retrieving these files to review for this post, I had forgotten about the discrete exposition in my Footnote No. 4 of the Motion that expresses the regret for the greater tragedy exposed by the situation; to wit:
The fact of receiving a volume of “hate mail” from lawyers who, in a mean-spirited way, direct the undersigned “simply to concede” and “simply to comply” with the Executive Order.
That is, lawyers condemning me for “pushing back” on a tyrannous act. Moreover, with reckless puerile invalid logic, and attempts to persuade (or force) by “attempted” personal insults. [5] I recall responding to one Facebook public condemnation that the posting person (who I am not convinced read the documents) “apparently read the Motion one time less than necessary to understand that love was the basis for the claim.” Who loves what more is, of course, the subject of applied principles.
In any case, here is Footnote No. 4, stated in full, as set forth in the Motion to the Supreme Court of the United States, suggesting that attacks by laypeople are understandable. But attacks by lawyers, perhaps not so much, because the latter implicates and portends a failure of systemic integrity, and woe to us. [6, 2.2]
The following should be noted: The Constitution of the United States and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania are documents of mutual assent. Such as U.S. Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. stated in The Common Law, Lecture VII, it is immaterial why a person breaches a contract, he or she either performs or suffers the remedy. And, yet, such as it is, we know that a smirk on the face of a person who violates a contract can disclose something circumstantial about the violation. Similarly, the implied or expressed insult by Gov. Wolf upon Judicial Officers might not be material to the violation or remedy sought, but it discloses something circumstantial about his violation.
In the larger sense, this circumstantial fact is not even the worst danger: the worst danger is that the undersigned has received a volume of “hate mail” from licensed attorneys who, in a mean-spirited way, direct the undersigned “simply to concede” and “simply to comply” with the Executive Order.
The public opinion that is in the middle, many of whom taking the position that “attorneys are no different from anyone else, simply obey Gov. Wolf” is less concerning; laypersons are not trained in the law, and, therefore, that lay opinion is forgivable, since they who say so know not what they do. [2.3]
The right to receive legal counsel is essential—indeed, quintessential—and it must remain independent and sacrosanct to preserve our freedoms as an American Constitutional Republic.
Jack Cade: “Be brave, then; for your captain is brave, and vows reformation. There shall be in England seven halfpenny loaves sold for a penny: the three-hooped pot shall have ten hoops; and I will make it felony to drink small beer.”
Dick the Butcher: “The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.”
Jack Cade: “Nay, that I mean to do. Is not this a lamentable thing, that of the skin of an innocent lamb should be made parchment? That parchment, being scribbled o’er, should undo a man?”
Henry VI, Part 2, Act IV, Scene II, by William Shakespeare (Darkly comical perhaps, but, to paraphrase, anarchy and despotism begin with killing the lawyers.)
Without suggesting AI’s correctness, here’s how AI viewed it. Behold, the things we do for love. Such as in the Google Trespass Case [7], making the record for posterior review and consideration is applied respect for time, which always gets its day. What’s past is prologue. [8]
🏁 Final Verdict
While the legal question may be strong, the procedure—filing directly with SCOTUS via mandamus—was almost certainly doomed from the start. Zegarelli knew this and acknowledged it was more of a principled civic gesture to put the issue on record than a practical expectation of relief.
Zegarelli’s petition is an impassioned and intellectually well-argued constitutional plea, but it was never going to succeed procedurally in the U.S. Supreme Court. Still, as a symbolic civic act, it reflects a deep commitment to judicial independence and constitutional balance—even during emergencies.
[*] The Challenge of Vaccines, or Predictive Delusion [GRZUID123] [LinkedIn #GRZ_123] [Ed. Note: If the comments to this post are preserved on LinkedIn, it is somewhat illustrative. Not “hate mail,” but, it may be inferred from the reactive tone there, what the tone was like in emails. And one of the condemning posts there was from an attorney professor.]
[1] Me, Too; Not, You. Or, the Exceptional Principle. – Stand for America® [GRZ83] [LinkedIn #GRZ_83]
[2] The ONE LinkedIn Reference Set [GRZ183] [LinkedIn #GRZ_183] 2.1 ONE: 1020 [T12:31; R3:28] (“Insult Jesus, But Not the Holy Spirit“); 2.2 ONE 2211 [T23:25, L11:39] (“The Woes-Hypocrisy“); 2.3 ONE: 2781 [T27:35, R15:24] (“Forgive Them“)
[3] THE JUDICIAL OATH: I DO SOLEMNLY SWEAR AND AFFIRM…; Or, How Wrong Can It Get? [GRZ131_1] [LinkedIn #GRZ_131_1]
[4] The Price for Deception; Or, What Goes Around. – No. 98. The Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing – The Essential Aesop™ – Back to Basics Abridgment Series [GRZ98_98] [LinkedIn #GRZ_98_98]
[5] Whom the Gods Would Destroy, They First Tease with Political Incorrectness [GRZ74] [LinkedIn #GRZ_74]
[6] Critical Thinking and the Conflation of Character, Integrity, Goodness and Virtue [GRZ148] [LinkedIn #GRZ_148]
[7] The Google Privacy Case – 10 Year Anniversary – Business of Aesop™ No. 101 – The Porcupine and the Cave [GRZ84] [LinkedIn #GRZ_84]
[8] Shakespeare, English Language, and Other Such Items [GRZ62] [LinkedIn #GRZ_62]
GRZ242.20250409 GRZUID242