By Rick Pluta, Michigan Public Radio Network
Lansing, MI – Lansing, MI (MPRN) - The new majority on the Michigan Supreme Court has begun chipping away at some of the precedents set when the court was controlled by Republicans.
The state Supreme Court's Republican majority was fractured last November when voters replaced GOP Justice Cliff Taylor with Democrat Dianne Hathaway.
The court is now controlled by a Republican majority in name only because Justice Betty Weaver sides so often with the three Democratic justices.
And that was the case in a recent decision where the court reversed a ruling it made last year when it was still controlled by Republicans.
The new decision gives workers compensation benefits to a woman who was injured walking from her car to her job.
Justice Stephen Markman was joined by two other Republicans in his dissent.
Markman complained that the court's new makeup is the only reason the earlier decision was reversed.