<x-flowed>The story about the "veteran" designation is interesting. The most recent
Supreme Court case to deal with ballot notations is Gralike v. Cook
(informed voter notation dealing with position on term limits) which
decided the issue on the elections clause ground so that the holding
applies only to elections for federal office. An older case, Anderson v.
Martin, held unconstitutional a Louisiana statute requiring the race of the
candidate be included in a ballot notation. The case was an equal
protection challenge and strict scrutiny was applied.
There are some cases where candidates have attacked the "incumbent"
notation -- a 1974 opinion by a D.C. in Georgia upheld the designation as
rationally related to the state interest of providing information to voters
(Williamson v. Fortson). I couldn't find quickly, nor do I remember,
courts striking down such designations -- I'd be interested to hear what
other people know about the cases. From the news story linked to Rick's
email, it appears that Brockton already allowed an incumbent label
("candidate for re-election"). Some courts have struck down requirements
that incumbents be listed first on the ballot.
In California, candidates list occupation (the recall ballot had some great
occupational designations!), and many pick occupations designed to provide
positive cues for voters as much as to describe occupation. The relevant
statute is: A "ballot designation" may take one of three forms under Cal.
Elec. Code ¤ 13107:(1) words designating the elective city, county,
district, state, or federal office which the candidate holds at the time of
filing the nomination documents to which he or she was elected by vote of
the people, or to which he or she was appointed, in the case of a superior
or municipal court judge;(2) the word "incumbent" if the candidate is a
candidate for the same office which he or she holds at the time of filing
the nomination papers, and was elected to that office by a vote of the
people, or, in the case of a superior or municipal court judge, was
appointed to that office; or (3) no more than three words designating
either the current principal professions, vocations, or occupations of the
candidate, or the principal professions, vocations, or occupations of the
candidate during the calendar year immediately preceding the filing of
nomination documents. Cal. Elec. Code ¤ 13107(a)(1)-(3).The statute further
mandates that neither the California Secretary of State nor any other
election official shall accept a designation that would mislead the
voter. Under this statute a notation that describes the candidate's status
(which "peace activist" was determined to be in a case dealing with a Santa
Monica election) is not an acceptable notation; so presumably "veteran" is
not acceptable under the California statute either. If the statute was
changed to allow status or other description beyond occupation, then
presumably a broader range of ballot notations would be acceptable.
The question I had after reading the article was whether "veteran" was the
only status designation allowed -- if it is, then one could argue that the
state is indicating that "veteran" is a relevant status to voters in a way
other statuses, occupations are not. That might trigger some of the
concerns the Court described in Gralike. Of course, allowing "incumbent"
as a label also communicates a message (although in a world of
anti-incumbent feeling it's not clear that the message is a positive one
for the incumbents). If the proposal is to allow a wider range of
notations, it seems more likely to withstand challenge.
At 07:08 AM 4/14/2004, Rick Hasen wrote:
"Proposed Rules for '527' Groups Lead to Some Unusual Alliances"
The Washington Post offers
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9493-2004Apr13.html>this
report.
"House Approves 'Veteran" Tag for Brockton Candidates"
The Enterprise (Brockton, MA) offers
<http://www.southofboston.com/articles/2004/04/13/2headlines/news/news/news02.txt>this
report. Thanks to Mark Kemper for the pointer. Mark asks: "Is this legal?"
A very interesting question. Perhaps Beth Garrett or other readers who
know a lot a bout the ballot label litigation can answer that question. I
assume that this label will benefit some candidates and harm others, much
like giving incumbents the chance to write "incumbent" or "mayor," etc.
Yet Another Review of the Chief Justice's Book Finding a Connection
with....You Know
See Benjamin Wittes's
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9924-2004Apr13.html>Washington
Post<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9924-2004Apr13.html>
review.
NY Times Story on FEC 527 Hearing
It is
<http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/14/politics/campaign/14MEMO.html?ex=1082520000&en=90e778b7ae1e933c&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE>here.
Symposium on "The Supreme Court and Election Law"
Notre Dame Law School and the <http://www.nd.edu/%7Endlaw/jleg/>Journal of
Legislation are sponsoring a mini-symposium on my book,
<http://www.nyupress.org/product_info.php?cPath=&products_id=3383>The
Supreme Court and Election Law: Judging Equality from Baker v. Carr to
<http://www.nyupress.org/product_info.php?cPath=&products_id=3383>Bush v.
Gore. The symposium will be on April 22 at the Notre Dame Law School
courtroom beginning at 9 am.
Participants include
<http://www.nd.edu/%7Endlaw/faculty/facultypages/nagle.html>John Nagle of
Notre Dame, <http://www.law.umn.edu/FacultyProfiles/CharlesG.htm>Guy
Charles of the University of Minnesota,
<http://www.law.indiana.edu/directory/lfr.asp>Luis Fuente-Rohwer of
Indiana, and <http://www.lls.edu/academics/faculty/hasen.html>me. The
Journal of Legislation will publish papers from the mini-symposium.
By the way,
<http://www.law.berkeley.edu/faculty/profiles/facultyProfile.php?facID=1141>Dan
Farber's review of my book in the current issue of the
<http://www.liebertpub.com>Election Law Journal, "Implementing Equality,"
has an interesting discussion the debate between my rights approach and
the structuralist approach of
<http://www.law.nyu.edu/faculty/profiles/fulltime/pildesr.html>Rick Pildes
and <http://www.law.columbia.edu/faculty/full_time_fac?&main.find=I,>Sam
Issacharoff. (By the way, even though I co-edit Election Law Journal, I
was recused from deciding if my book should be reviewed and, if so, who
the reviewer should be.)
C-SPAN Slated to Broadcast 527 Hearings
A reliable source tells me that C-SPAN is planning to broadcast the two
days of hearings at the FEC on the 527 rulemaking. The source cautions:
"As you know, CSPAN broadcast decisions can change from hour to hour, so
this may change."
By the way, this is the 1,001 blog post on this new blog site (not
counting the posts on the old blogspot site), a milestone of sorts.
--
Rick Hasen
Professor of Law and William M. Rains Fellow
Loyola Law School
919 South Albany Street
Los Angeles, CA 90015-1211
(213)736-1466
(213)380-3769 - fax
<mailto:rick.hasen@lls.edu>rick.hasen@lls.edu
http://www.lls.edu/academics/faculty/hasen.html
<http://electionlawblog.org>http://electionlawblog.org
Elizabeth Garrett
Professor of Law,
University of Southern California Law School
Director, USC-Caltech Center
for the Study of Law and Politics
http://lawweb.usc.edu/cslp/
Board of Directors, Initiative and Referendum Institute
at USC
http://iri.usc.edu/
699 Exposition Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90089
Phone: 213-821-5438 (office)
(310) 968-5398 (cellphone)
Fax: 213-740-5502
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