[EL] Does the Democracy Canon Support Removing Taylor's Name from #KSSEN Ballot?

[Sean Parnell]

One concern with the Democracy Canon and the idea that Taylor should be
allowed to remove himself from the ballot, over the objection of the state
officer whom I presume has the authority and discretion to make a
determination, is that it would seem to encourage and enable a variety of
political stunts, backroom dealing, and gamesmanship that I suspect will
over time tend to lessen the public's trust in the political process.

 

One obvious scenario is that it would allow a political party to essentially
put two candidates on the ballot early on, one on the official line the
other on either an independent/unaffiliated line or on the line of a
sympathetic third party, and then make their real pick late in the game,
pressuring the candidate who isn't doing as well to drop out. That's
probably not as much of a problem for states with late primaries, but in
states that chose their candidates for the fall in the spring (as about half
of all states do
<http://www.ncsl.org/research/elections-and-campaigns/2014-state-primary-dat
es-and-runoff.aspx> , according to NCSL - technically two of them choose in
late winter) it isn't difficult to see this scenario being employed for no
other reason than the party deciding their better off with someone other
than whomever was chosen in the primary (which pretty much seems to be the
case here in Kansas).

 

I'd also note, with apologies to Rick if I'm mistaken in the application of
the Democracy Canon, the interesting split between this case and 2002 with
Torricelli - in Kansas the Democracy Canon requires depriving voters of a
Democrat on the ballot, while in 2002 it apparently meant ensuring that
there was a Democrat on the ballot.

 

The bottom line is, I see much mischief ahead if as a general rule we wave
off statutory requirements and the exercise of discretionary authority by
officeholders elected to exercise that discretionary authority, essentially
in order to satisfy the political cravings of the moment. Just as
Republicans were stuck with Akin even after it was fairly apparent he was
not viable candidate, it appears to me that Democrats should be stuck with
having a Democrat on their ballot line that they perhaps would prefer not be
there.

 

Sean Parnell

President

Impact Policy Management, LLC

6411 Caleb Court

Alexandria, VA  22315

571-289-1374 (c)

sean at impactpolicymanagement.com

 

 

Posted in  <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10> campaign finance


 <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=65200> Does the Democracy Canon Support
Removing Taylor's Name from #KSSEN Ballot?


Posted on  <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=65200> September 9, 2014 9:18 pm
by  <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3> Rick Hasen

Taylor makes essentially that argument in the
<http://www.kansas.com/news/politics-government/election/article2044679.ece/
binary/Chad%20Taylor%20memorandum%20in%20support%20of%20petition.pdf>
memorandum supporting the writ of mandamus filed in the KS Supreme Court.

I think that's probably right. What good does it do to give voters the
choice of a candidate who has attempted to withdraw and who has pledged not
to serve?  So to the extent the statute is ambiguous about what was required
for Taylor to withdraw, the
<http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1344476> Democracy Canon
suggests interpreting it to allow Taylor to withdraw. In some ways this is
like the Samson case from New Jersey Torrecelli which I discuss in detail in
the article: a State supreme court has to construe a statute about how to
deal with a withdrawing candidate shortly before the time of printing of
ballots.

 
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