Democracy Disenfranchised: Detroit's Next Mayor Won't Be Allowed to Govern

A hundred and fifty years ago, in the thick of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln rejected the counsel that suggested he might postpone the 1864 presidential election on the grounds that the national circumstance was too chaotic for voting.

“We cannot have free government without elections,” declared the sixteenth president. “If the rebellion could force us to forgo, or postpone a national election it might fairly claim to have already conquered and ruined us.”

Austerity's Cruelest Cut: Democracy Denied in Detroit

When the voters of Detroit were given the opportunity to decide whether they wanted Rick Snyder to have a role in running their city, it did not go well.

Snyder, as the Republican nominee for governor in 2010, finished with just 5 percent of the vote.

As in: He lost the city by a 20-1 margin.

Detroit Emergency Manager: Gov. Rick Snyder Announces State Financial Takeover

Gov. Rick Snyder will appoint an emergency financial manager to take over control of Michigan’s largest city, he said Thursday in Detroit. The announcement follows his declaration of a fiscal emergency in the city.

"I'm confirming my determination of a financial emergency," Snyder said. "I'm going to ask the Emergency Loan Board to move forward with the plan of appointing an emergency manager for the city of Detroit."

Roy Roberts: New Detroit District Will Include Charters, School Closures

NEW YORK -- Roy Roberts, a former GM executive, says his first few months on the job as emergency manager of Detroit's public schools have been "like drinking from a fire hose."

"I had five weeks to pull together a budget for 2012," he said in an interview. "That's not a simple process."

So far, his tenure has entailed cutting salaries across the board by 10 percent; imposing $81 million in wage concessions; and announcing a new state-run educational authority to oversee Michigan's lowest-performing schools that will pilot in Detroit next year. He has also faced several lawsuits and seen 11 people charged with stealing from the city's schools.

Some of these may seem far-reaching decisions and unusual challenges for a schools chief. That's because they are. Under Michigan's Public Act Four, which created his role, Roberts has near carte-blanche power over Detroit's schools and the people who run them.