[EL] some analysis of Texas order

[Edward Still]

Vince, good points.

This is the kind of mess you get when you have a court on which there is no
former candidate for elective office. On the other hand, there have been
plenty of messes like this with three-judge courts or single judges staying
deadlines and throwing everyone into a tizzy about "where do I run" and
"how the hell can I run a campaign if I don't know who the electorate is?"


Edward Still
Edward Still Law Firm LLC
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Birmingham AL 35209
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  www.votelaw.com/blog
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On Fri, Dec 9, 2011 at 6:56 PM, Vince Leibowitz
<vince.leibowitz at gmail.com>wrote:

> Suffice it to say, this has quite a few of us reeling here in Texas.
>
> I am hopeful that an interim order will be issued allowing use of the use
> of the interim maps created by the three-judge panel--or some other actual
> instructions or guidance that shows this does not essentially constitute a
> de facto removal of these positions from the March primary ballot. I cannot
> imagine the chaos if one, two, or all three of these types of ballot
> positions are dumped from the March primary ballot and special primaries
> are required. Of course, I'd rather not see folks run through the primary
> only to have to re-run in different districts when the court finally
> decides this case.
>
> If all three of these ballot positions aren't on the March Primary (which,
> at this point, I'm wondering *how* they would be on the March primary
> ballot), I can see two sets of very turnout-depressed elections and some
> very unhappy folks at the state political parties that have to find the
> funds to hold not one but two primaries.
>
> There just seems like few good options here. We encouraged our clients not
> to file until after the court made a decision on this case, although a
> couple didn't follow our advice and have now filed for districts that are
> "stayed." The myriad of questions popping into my inbox right now range
> from "will the party be obligated to return my filing fee," to "if the
> district boundaries don't change for us, are the petition-in-lieu-of-filing
> fee signatures we already collected going to be good later, and can we get
> them back from the party to file again, or do we have to start over and
> collect new signatures?" all the way to "what happens if I re-file for my
> county-level office now and win the primary and then they re-draw these
> maps and I want to file for the legislative office I originally intended to
> file for?" Our answer for most of these questions right now is, "we're
> trying to find out," which is the more professional way of saying, "who
> knows?"
>
> What a disaster.
>
> Vince Leibowitz
>
> On Fri, Dec 9, 2011 at 6:38 PM, Rick Hasen <rhasen at law.uci.edu> wrote:
>
>>  Breaking News: Supreme Court Will Hear Texas Redistricting Cases<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=26336>
>> Posted on December 9, 2011 4:06 pm <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=26336>
>> by Rick Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>
>>
>> SCOTUSBlog<http://www.scotusblog.com/2011/12/texas-election-maps-blocked-for-now/>:
>> “The Supreme Court, working late on a Friday, agreed to rule on the
>> constitutionality of three redistricting plans for the two houses of the
>> Texas legislature and its U.S. House of Representatives delegation, and put
>> on hold temporarily a U.S. District Court’s interim maps.”
>>
>> Here<http://sblog.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Perry_v_Perez_et_al-12-9-11.pdf>is the Court’s order.
>>
>> Given what the Court did, with no stated dissents, it is not clear why
>> this had to wait until Friday at 7 pm eastern to issue.
>>
>> More importantly, it is also not clear what is supposed to happen now in
>> Texas.  What districts can be used, if the districts crafted by the
>> three-judge court are now “stayed pending further order of this Court?”
>>
>> The case will be argued on January 9.  It is possible the Court will
>> grant an interim order before then addressing which districts should be
>> used. (Perhaps that was the reason for the delay, and it did not come
>> together.  Were they cobbling together a plan and/or an order?  Were there
>> dissents?)  Or the Court may try to rush an opinion soon after argument.
>>
>> Notably, what the Court did *not* do is remand the case to the lower
>> court to redraw the districts with greater deference to the Texas-submitted
>> plans (as Texas had requested).  My surmise is that the second opinion
>> issued by that court, the one Judge Smith in dissent characterized<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=26059>as having the “smell of brief on appeal,” could well have caused the
>> Supreme Court to lose faith in whether the lower court would faithfully
>> carry out such an order.
>>
>> And now the Supreme Court is going to be thrust in the unusual position
>> of deciding a case with immediate partisan consequences.  It is no
>> exaggeration to say that with three or four additional Democratic seats at
>> issue under the original Court-drawn plan, the decision could help decide
>> control of the House.
>>  [image: Share]<http://www.addtoany.com/share_save#url=http%3A%2F%2Felectionlawblog.org%2F%3Fp%3D26336&title=Breaking%20News%3A%20Supreme%20Court%20Will%20Hear%20Texas%20Redistricting%20Cases&description=>
>>   Posted in redistricting <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=6>, Supreme
>> Court <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=29>, Voting Rights Act<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=15>
>> | Comments Off
>>
>>
>> On 12/9/11 4:09 PM, Rick Hasen wrote:
>>
>> http://electionlawblog.org/?p=26336
>>
>>  Breaking News: Supreme Court Will Hear Texas Redistricting Cases<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=26336>
>> Posted on December 9, 2011 4:06 pm <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=26336>
>> by Rick Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>
>>
>> SCOTUSBlog<http://www.scotusblog.com/2011/12/texas-election-maps-blocked-for-now/>:
>> “The Supreme Court, working late on a Friday, agreed to rule on the
>> constitutionality of three redistricting plans for the two houses of the
>> Texas legislature and its U.S. House of Representatives delegation, and put
>> on hold temporarily a U.S. District Court’s interim maps.”
>>
>> This post will be updated.
>>  [image: Share]<http://www.addtoany.com/share_save#url=http%3A%2F%2Felectionlawblog.org%2F%3Fp%3D26336&title=Breaking%20News%3A%20Supreme%20Court%20Will%20Hear%20Texas%20Redistricting%20Cases&description=>
>>   Posted in redistricting <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=6>, Supreme
>> Court <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=29>, Voting Rights Act<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=15>
>> | Comments Off |
>>
>> --
>> Rick Hasen
>> Professor of Law and Political Science
>> UC Irvine School of Law
>> 401 E. Peltason Dr., Suite 1000
>> Irvine, CA 92697-8000
>> 949.824.3072 - office
>> 949.824.0495 - fax
>> rhasen at law.uci.edu
>> http://law.uci.edu/faculty/page1_r_hasen.html
>> http://electionlawblog.org
>>
>>
>> --
>> Rick Hasen
>> Professor of Law and Political Science
>> UC Irvine School of Law
>> 401 E. Peltason Dr., Suite 1000
>> Irvine, CA 92697-8000
>> 949.824.3072 - office
>> 949.824.0495 - fax
>> rhasen at law.uci.edu
>> http://law.uci.edu/faculty/page1_r_hasen.html
>> http://electionlawblog.org
>>
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>
>
>
> --
> _______________________________
> Vince Leibowitz
> Principal Consultant
> The Dawn Group
> vince.leibowitz at gmail.com
> vince at dgtexas.com
> DGTexas.com
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