For generations now, Chicago has had its own separate set of state laws for just about every topic under the sun. The city's mayor is allowed to appoint the school board, Chicago has its own "working cash fund" law, the state's mayoral-veto law does not apply to the city, and the city has a unique exemption allowing it to deduct money from worker paychecks. From big to archaic, the list is almost endless. So, when you've grown accustomed to doing it your own way for a century or so, you may start thinking you're a special case in literally everything. And that seems to be what happened last week.

After Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan appeared in all but actual name in ComEd's deferred federal-prosecution agreement, Representative Terra Costa Howard (D-Glen Ellyn) was one of the first Democratic state Representatives to call on him to resign without the qualifying “if he did it” language. And the freshman Democratic legislator has been breaking pretty much all precedent the past month or so by putting significant campaign money where her mouth is.

It's well-known that the Illinois House Republicans (along with pretty much all Illinois Republicans) are using House Speaker Michael Madigan's bad reputation to bludgeon their Democratic opponents. Speaker Madigan has been enormously unpopular in Illinois. It's probably worse now because he's been in the news so much during the long federal investigation into ComEd and the company's resulting deferred-prosecution agreement with the U.S. Attorney in Chicago.

There's been much gnashing of teeth since the state announced that just 21 social-equity applicants had qualified for regional lotteries that will award 75 cannabis-dispensary store licenses. The 21 winning entities submitted well over 300 applications for those 75 licenses, which has forced a tie-breaking round.