I don’t know either way, but it’s probably a combination of the two scenarios. Devil’s advocate and all that. I still haven’t seen the reports that Torricelli was pressured by Clinton, but don’t deny that that probably happened.
I’d still place the blame squarely at Torricelli for being a crook. The electorate got screwed by thier own representative. The 9% (or whatever) turnout in the Dem primary is the only thing that kept Sen T on the ballot, while the rank & file turned thier backs on him, deservedly so.
WRT ballot-switching: I’m not trying to paint this as an ideal scenario – it’s a nightmare, that shouldn’t have happened. But the Dems replacing the name on the ballot isn’t so much nefarious as it will be ineffective. Whatever happens in court, it’s a desperate and weak strategy.
I think you’re probably right. But in the end it won’t matter. Bait&Switch won’t become a viable strategy because a) it’s nuts, and b) it will be defeated soundly in NJ because i) the voters won’t stand for it and ii) Sen T.'s reputation demands it, and i) this scrambling makes the dems look silly.
NJ will go to the GOP because the Dems fielded a scumbag, whatever last minute shennanigans happen in the next few days.
BTW, I’m still interested if anyone has a cite (I’ll try to google some myself, but the search terms are broad) -
WRT some previous concerns earlier in this thread about Torricelli’s campaign funds going to a different candidate:
What is the ‘usual’ procedure to deal with unspent campaign funds if a candidate doesn’t run (e.g., they die)? I take it the funds go to the candidate’s party (as hard or soft money?), which seems like the only reasonable scenario, but I’ve never heard one way or the other.
I’ll go along with that. It also doesn’t matter who’s idea it was, in the final analysis it was Torricelli’s decision to quit the race, thus abandoning his supporters and throwing the FUBAR wrench into the election.
Will it be effective? Probably not. Then again, it raises a lot of attention about the importance of the seat, and now I suspect this election has a decent possibility of turning based on the larger politics rather than the strengths of the candidates.
The Democrats are certainly not “stealing” the election. How are they forcing anyone to vote either way? If the Republicans are stuck with an unelectable candidate, they can certainly prevail upon him to quit and let a better one run instead. If they have one, that is. “But we were gonna beat Torricelli! It isn’t fair that he can quit first!”, they shriek, stamping their little feet and pouting, instead of thinking of how to use their remaining time to figure out how to convince the electorate to vote for Forrester instead of Lautenberg, or to find somebody better than Forrester.
Sam, can you seriously tell us you care as much about your own country’s politics as a foreign country’s? This is a most odd sight, a partisan Republican without a Republican party of his own.
Dewey, not to belabor the point, but it’s clear not only what pretext SCOTUS used to rule the way they wanted to in Bush, but that it was a pretext. Pretty clearly, the principle of equal protection requires that a vote have an equal chance of being counted regardless of who cast it. Their rulings had the opposite effect. Only the most naive (and we have a few here) and the most partisan truly see a constitutional principle defended there.
That’s exactly what I’m afraid of. We have a process fro this in place. It’s called “primary” and “campaign.”
There is a cutoff for these two things when the candidates are supposed to be finalized, and then the voters get to decide based on what they’ve seen.
Surely you’re not in favor of 11th hour changes. Surely you don’t think the laws that govern elections are mere customs to be ignored for expedience when the whim suits.
To paraphrase Inigo Montoya, “I do not think that law means what you think it means.”
It’s for the courts of New Jersey to decide what New Jersey laws mean. They have done so. There is no remaining confusion. You may have an opinion, but it’s not an authoritative one; the SCONJ’s opinion, on the other hand, is.
Elvis - I can’t believe this issue won’t die. Here in New Jersey, there is no set of facts that gives rise to an Equal Protection violation. In Florida, difference counties were being counted by different standards. This was a violation of Equal Protection.
In short: here the Democrats are right. There the Republicans were right.
**From Torricelli’s complete announcement. NY Times, will require registration, and probably will be stuck back in the Times Archives in 7 days. I am editing out a good deal of the sentimental claptrap, although I’m leaving in the Clinton bit at the end, 'cause as mawkish political speeches go, it’s a classic.
Okay, so here’s the “Clinton bit”.
So to hear him tell it, it was all his idea, and they all tried to talk him out of it, and he’s only doing it for the good of the Republic. Why am I flashing on that short story where somebody sees Lincoln’s ghost and it asks, “Does the Union still stand?” and the guy says, “Yes, Mr. President, the Union still stands” and the ghost nods and leaves?
Well, you are belaboring the point. Rather than revive the topic that launched a thousand threads, I’ll just say that reasonable, non-naive, non-partisan minds can differ on how principled the equal protection argument given the specific (and very unusual) goings-on in Florida in 2000.
It seems to me that the NJSC basically altered the law after the fact to accomodate this change, kinda like that neat trick where Henry VIII retroactively reversed his marriage so that it never happened.
**Glad you’re not confused, honey, because the rest of us are sitting here holding our heads, going “owww…”
If I’m following this correctly…
Monday, September 30: At about 5 p.m. EDT, Torricelli resigns. Somewhere, a starting gun goes off.
Shortly afterwards, probably about suppertime, the NJ attorney general tells the county election clerks to wait for a ruling from the state Superior Court before they start printing up the regular ballots.
Tuesday, October 1:
Tuesday morning: The Dems file suit with the state Superior Court to stop all the county clerks from printing up ballots. The State Superior court judge agrees, issuing a restraining order. She also instructs all 21 county clerks to meet with her on Thursday morning to figure out just exactly how they’re going to go about changing the ballots to take off Torricelli’s name and put on the name of whoever the Dems pick as the replacement. This isn’t like where you can just run off a few more on the Xerox machine.
The Dems also ask the state Supreme Court to decide right away whether it’s okay for them to put someone else on the ballot instead of Torricelli.
Tuesday noon: The state Supreme Court agrees to decide about that, and right away.
Tuesday afternoon: the Democrats announce Lautenberg as the replacement candidate, to go on the ballot as soon as the state Supreme court says it’s okay.
Wednesday, October 2: The state Supreme Court says it’s okay for the Dems to put Lautenberg on the ballot instead of Torricelli.
Thursday, October 3: The GOP, vowing to “fight this all the way to the Supreme Court”–do. They ask the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the NJ state Supreme Court .
Meanwhile, 21 county clerks (remember them?) meet with the state superior court judge, and they all glumly survey the clerical mess ahead of them. “This is chaos,” one of them is quoted as saying. Not the least of their worries is the fact that the $800,000 the Dems have been required to pony up for the change won’t cover overtime.
Friday, October 4: The Democrats politely ask the U.S. Supreme Court to stay out of it.
And that’s where the matter rests, as of this posting. The Supremes can decide to (a) overturn the state supreme court ruling, (b) hear the GOP’s complaint, or (c) stay out of it altogether.
CNN.com notes, “There was no timeframe for their decision.” I think it would serve the whole kit ‘n’ kaboodle of 'em right if the Supremes decided to take the weekend off and make 'em sweat.
To me, the most incomprehensible thing is the way the state Superior Court judge seems to have simply assumed on Tuesday that of course it was going to be all right for the ballots to be changed, that it wasn’t a question of “whether” but simply “how”. Was that proper for her to decide?
The following links helped contribute to my massive headache. And I don’t even live in New Jersey…
Exactly. But the obvious, and only, cure was to count them using the same standards, as much as good faith would allow. This the FSC tried to enforce, but the Bushies fought, and SCOTUS prevented it. Result: Votes in certain counties did have a higher probability of being counted than in other counties. That’s where the principle of equal protection was flouted in the name of protecting it. The motivations for doing so remain as obvious as ever.
Dewey, sorry if you think it’s belaboring the point, but subversion of the basic principles of democracy is something that’s always going to be a topic of discussion. Might as well get used to it, friend.
Now, as for this case, the only question is what pretext these people are going to dream up as a rationale, not how they’ll rule. It isn’t a legal matter at all, really, simply political drama that the Scalia faction has shown itself unable to resist entering.
Scylla, the question at hand is whose name is actually printed on the ballot. Any voter can either pull any lever or write in any name they like, and that was true before, too. No one’s legal or constitutional rights are being infringed. Upon what principle do you raise your objection?
So minty, you don’t think it’s reasonable to allow the voters to have enough time to actually familiarize themselves with the candidates and the issues? I’m confident that I’m not the only voter who actually researches a candidate or issue and attempts to make an informed decision.
Is it really empowering the voter to throw a new candidate at him with only the time necessary to print and mail ballots? I’d be pretty upset as a voter if I had to vote on a candidate that just popped up, after the work I put into preparing for the election.
Only a month until the election, emarkp. Better get cracking or who knows what kind of space alien you might end up voting for with so little time to study.
Who can blame you? You thought, as I did before the NJSC ruled, that NJ law prohibted a replacement name on the ballot if a candidate withdraws within 51 days of an election.
But it turns out that the general intent of the NJ election laws is to “preserve the two-party system and to submit to the electorate a ballot bearing the names of candidates of both major political parties…”
N.J.S.A. 19:13-20, the law about vacancies, says at the beginning:
It says absolutely nothing about what should be done in case of a vacancy that happens later then the 51st day before the election. It’s simply silent.
Now, you might conclude that the NJ legislature meant to imply that there was no way to replace a candidate inside the 51 day mark – after all, they wrote elaborate procedures to handle the 51+ day case, and didn’t say a word about the 51- day case – they must have meant that what they were legislating was the only way to replace a candidate.
When a law is plain and unambiguous, the courts must apply its plain meaning. They are not permitted toi reconstruct the law or inquire as to legislative intent. But if a law is unambiguous, the courts may look to legislative intent to divine the proper interpretation.
If the NJ lawmakers had merely added the line, “No name on the ballot shall be replaced within 51 days of an election,” then we’d have a different case here. But they didn’t. They failed to address it at all. So the NJ Supremes looked at past case law, at the general intent of the election laws, and decided that the law in New Jersey heavily favored the two-party system. In order to effectuate this intent, they fashioned the equitable remedy of permitting the Democratic party to name the new candidate.
Until the NJ legislature clarifies their intent differently, this is the law in New Jersey.
