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JUSTICE MAAG delivered the opinion of the court:

James G. Turner-El (the plaintiff) is an inmate in the Illinois Department ofCorrections (Department) serving a 60-year term of imprisonment for armed robbery,attempted murder, and unlawful restraint. Public records of the Department, of which wemay take judicial notice (see People v. Williams, 328 Ill. App. 3d 879, 887, 767 N.E.2d 511,519 (2002)), identify the plaintiff as James Turner, inmate No. N01161. Under section 2-401(b) of the Code of Civil Procedure (735 ILCS 5/2-401(b) (West 2002)), the misnomer ofa party may be corrected at any time, before or after a judgment. On the court's own motion,the caption of this case has been amended to reflect the plaintiff's proper name and inmatenumber for record-keeping purposes.

The plaintiff filed a petition for mandamus relief. The circuit court of RandolphCounty granted a motion to dismiss filed by Mary West, a paralegal at Menard CorrectionalCenter (Menard), Elisa Rea, a paralegal at Menard, Mavis Gross, a grievance officer atMenard, and Jonathan R. Walls, the warden of Menard (the defendants). The plaintiffappeals and asserts that his petition was sufficient to withstand the motion to dismiss,warranting the reversal of the trial court's order and a remand of the case to the circuit courtwith directions. Mandamus relief is sought by filing a complaint, not a petition, and thus wewill refer to the filing as a complaint for mandamus relief that sought an order of mandamus,not a writ of mandamus. See People ex rel. Braver v. Washington, 311 Ill. App. 3d 179, 181n.1, 724 N.E.2d 68, 70 n.1 (1999).
 

On March 31, 2002, the plaintiff filed a complaint for mandamus relief in the circuitcourt of Randolph County. He asserted that between July 2001 and February 2002,defendants West and Rea had refused to perform their ministerial duties to provide him with"[X]erox copy/notary and other legal services" and "not to retaliate against plaintiff forpending lawsuits." He also asserted that they continued to refuse to photocopy "numerouspleadings" of an unspecified nature and "grievance complaints" in retaliation for his lawsuits.He did not describe the nature of the pleadings he sought to have copied, the courts in whichthey were to be filed, the dates upon which they were to be filed, or the dates upon whichthe defendants refused to make photocopies. He claimed that as a result of West's and Rea'sactions, he suffered unspecified detriment in various unnamed federal and state causes ofaction and was unable to file grievances of an unspecified nature and to pursue them to thepoint of exhausting his administrative remedies.

The plaintiff asserted that defendant Gross had failed to perform her ministerial dutyto decide grievances or to address unspecified "rewritten grievances from July 2001 throughFebruary 2002, etc.," thereby precluding him from exhausting his administrative remediesas a predicate to pursuing unspecified legal remedies. He failed to provide any dates ordetails about the allegedly unaddressed grievances or what legal remedies he was precludedfrom pursuing due to Gross's claimed inaction. Defendant Walls was alleged by the plaintiffto have failed to fulfill his ministerial duty to address "all grievances" (the nature, dates, andnumber of which were not specified) that the plaintiff had forwarded to him as emergencygrievances between February 2002 and the date of the filing of the mandamus complaint. All the defendants' actions allegedly violated Department regulations and denied theplaintiff's rights under the constitutions of the State of Illinois and the United States. Theplaintiff sought an order of mandamus directing the defendants to photocopy his grievancesand legal pleadings in order that he might have access to the courts, to issue decisions ongrievances, and to refrain from retaliating against him for filing grievances and complaints.

On May 7, 2003, the defendants moved pursuant to section 2-615 of the Code of CivilProcedure (735 ILCS 5/2-615 (West 2002)) to dismiss the plaintiff's complaint for the failureto state a cause of action for mandamus relief. They noted that the fact that the plaintiff wasable to file a complaint for mandamus relief demonstrated that the defendants were obviouslyproviding the plaintiff with photocopy service. They went on to contend that the generalizednature of the complaint's allegations relating to access to the court system precluded the grantof relief, because under Lewis v. Casey, 518 U.S. 343, 135 L. Ed. 2d 606, 116 S. Ct. 2174(1996), the plaintiff was required to establish that an actual injury had accrued to him as aresult of their alleged failure to perform a nondiscretionary duty. The defendants alsocontended that mandamus should not issue because the plaintiff failed to provide any specificinformation about the grievances that he claimed had been ignored by Gross and Walls.

The plaintiff responded on May 29, 2003, to the defendants' motion to dismiss. Hereasserted the allegations of his complaint without elaboration and claimed that thedefendants' conduct "caused detriment to all [the plaintiff's] [s]tate and [f]ederal causes ofactions" in that they had been dismissed because he could not attach copies of his grievancesin order to prove that he had exhausted his administrative remedies prior to filing hiscomplaints in those forums. He again failed to provide any information about the specificcauses of action that had been affected by the defendants' alleged failure to providephotocopy services to him. The plaintiff asserted, "[E]ven though I did not list casenumbers[] or name specific courts, that's [sic] matters for discovery[,] and[] it does notnegate this court's ability to grant relief for defendant's [sic] failure to [X]erox hisgrievances." He also maintained that his failure to plead his grievance-related allegationswith specificity was a matter to be addressed in discovery.

On May 29, 2003, the court granted the defendants' motion to dismiss. It found thatthe defendants were not refusing to copy the plaintiff's pleadings, that the plaintiff had failedto establish a clear duty for the defendants to copy his grievances, that he had not beendenied access to the courts, and that he had failed to establish a clear right to have hisgrievances heard. Documents in the record filed by the plaintiff after the court's May 29,2003, order are, we observe, photocopied.
 

On appeal, the plaintiff contends that the grant of the defendants' motion to dismisswas erroneous. He argues that his complaint was sufficient to state a cause of action formandamus relief because he needed to do no more at the pleading stage than to allege thatdefendants West and Rea had refused and continued to refuse to photocopy his legalcomplaints and grievances and that Gross and Walls refused to address his grievances,thereby violating Department rules and the Illinois and United States Constitutions. He seeksthe reversal of the order dismissing his complaint and a remand of the case to the circuitcourt with directions. We assume that he wants this court to either direct the court toconduct further proceedings on his complaint or order it to grant mandamus relief to theplaintiff.

On a review of the grant of a motion to dismiss for the failure to state a cause ofaction, all well-pleaded facts and reasonable inferences from them are taken as true. In reApplication of Anderson, 313 Ill. App. 3d 578, 581, 730 N.E.2d 492, 494 (2000) (citing Mt.Zion State Bank & Trust v. Consolidated Communications, Inc., 169 Ill. 2d 110, 660 N.E.2d863 (1995)). However, conclusions in a complaint, unsupported by facts, will not beaccepted by the court as true. Jenkins v. Leininger, 277 Ill. App. 3d 313, 317, 659 N.E.2d1366, 1369 (1995). Although pro se pleadings are normally liberally construed (People v.Duke, 305 Ill. App. 3d 169, 172, 711 N.E.2d 484, 487 (1999)), a liberal construction will notbe utilized to remedy the failure of a complaint to plead sufficient facts to establish a causeof action. J. Eck & Sons, Inc. v. Reuben H. Donnelley Corp., 213 Ill. App. 3d 510, 514, 572N.E.2d 1090, 1093 (1991). This means that we will not fill in all the blanks in a pro secomplaint. Hamlin v. Vaudenberg, 95 F.3d 580, 583 (7th Cir. 1996). The grant of a motionto dismiss may be affirmed on any basis that appears of record, whether the trial courtdecided to dismiss on that basis or not. In re Marriage of Lehr, 317 Ill. App. 3d 853, 740N.E.2d 417 (2000); Murillo v. Page, 294 Ill. App. 3d 860, 864, 690 N.E.2d 1033, 1037(1998).
 

Mandamus proceedings are the proper means by which to compel the Department tofollow its own rules. Taylor v. Franzen, 93 Ill. App. 3d 758, 761, 417 N.E.2d 242, 244(1981), supplemental opinion on rehearing, 93 Ill. App. 3d 1152, 420 N.E.2d 1203 (1981). Mandamus may be used to compel a public officer to perform a duty that does not involvethe exercise of discretion by the officer (People ex rel. Braver v. Washington, 311 Ill. App.3d 179, 185, 724 N.E.2d 68, 73 (1999)), but mandamus will not issue to direct the mannerin which a discretionary act is performed (Freeman v. Lane, 129 Ill. App. 3d 1061, 1063, 473N.E.2d 584, 585 (1985)), even if the judgment or discretion has been erroneously exercised. Hanrahan v. Williams, 267 Ill. App. 3d 735, 737, 643 N.E.2d 262, 265 (1994), rev'd onother grounds, 174 Ill. 2d 268, 673 N.E.2d 251 (1996).

Mandamus is an extraordinary remedy that will be granted only where the plaintiffhas set forth every material fact needed to demonstrate that he has a clear right to the reliefrequested, there is a clear duty on the part of the defendant to act, and clear authority existsin the defendant to comply with an order granting mandamus relief. Baldacchino v.Thompson, 289 Ill. App. 3d 104, 109, 682 N.E.2d 182, 186 (1997). A "material fact" is onethat "is significant or essential to the issue or the matter at hand." Black's Law Dictionary611 (7th ed. 1999). The grant of a motion to dismiss a complaint for mandamus relief forthe failure to state a cause of action, like any other motion to dismiss filed pursuant to section2-615, is subject to de novo review. Ratliff-El v. Briley, 338 Ill. App. 3d 1070, 1072-73, 789N.E.2d 781, 782 (2003).
 

The plaintiff asserts that he stated a cause of action for mandamus relief by assertingthat despite the fact that defendants West and Rea had a nondiscretionary ministerial dutyto provide him with photocopies, they refused to photocopy for him in the past and continuedto refuse to copy documents for him, thereby depriving him of his constitutionally protectedright to access to the courts. In doing so, he attempts to engraft a civil rights action onto hismandamus complaint. He seems to believe that by saying the magic words "access to thecourts," he can transform a Department rule into a constitutional right. The plaintiff has filedphotocopies of his brief in this court, as well as in the circuit court, making it obvious thatDepartment employees are, in fact, providing him with photocopies at this time.

We recognize that Department regulations provide for the photocopying of certainlegal documents for inmates. The Illinois Administrative Code relating to library servicesand legal materials provides as follows in regard to photocopying documents for prisoners:

"Committed persons who are without funds shall be provided and charged for copyingservices for legal materials which may not be reasonably duplicated by other means. Legal documents shall be deemed to mean pleadings, complaints or petitions, briefs,exhibits, affidavits, notices of filing[,] or other documents to be filed in a court of lawor other forum in which a suit may be filed or which are required to be served uponopposing counsel or parties." (Emphasis added.) 20 Ill. Adm. Code