Harris' candidacy in judge's hands

Harris' candidacy in judge's hands
By GARY FINEOUT, CAPITAL BUREAU
08/30/02

TALLAHASSEE -- Before Katherine Harris makes it to Congress, she must not only win over the voters of Southwest Florida but she also must win over a Leon County judge who could derail her candidacy.

Circuit Judge Kevin Davey, the same judge who declared Florida's voucher program unconstitutional earlier this year, spent more than an hour Thursday hearing arguments on whether or not Harris should be removed from the ballot because she did not properly qualify.

It was a strikingly similar scene to the legal battles in the 2000 presidential election when lawyers for George W. Bush and Al Gore argued over Harris' interpretation of law. The irony wasn't lost on Davey, who at one point noted he must reconcile conflicting areas of election law "just like in Bush vs. Gore."

Davey did not immediately rule on the lawsuit brought by John Hill, who is Harris' lone Republican opponent in the Sept. 10 primary. There are also four Democrats and one write-in candidate seeking the seat now held by retiring U.S. Rep. Dan Miller, R-Bradenton.

Davey did, however, openly question the logic and arguments of both lawyers. He also made it clear that it would be unfair and expensive to make the elections supervisors of Charlotte, DeSoto, Hardee, Manatee and Sarasota counties remove Harris' name from the ballot. He reached an agreement with lawyers representing Hill and Harris that if he rules against Harris he will order supervisors to not count any votes she may receive.

"I think both sides presented very good arguments," said Hill, a former television anchorman who sat in the courtroom as lawyers argued before Davey. "The judge has a very difficult decision." He said he didn't expect the judge to rule until after the Labor Day weekend.

There was no dispute over the main facts behind the lawsuit. Harris was supposed to turn in a letter saying when she would resign as secretary of state when she qualified for Congress on July 15. She didn't discover her mistake until two weeks later when she sent Gov. Jeb Bush a letter on Aug. 1 explaining what had happened. Bush appointed former Secretary of State Jim Smith to succeed her.

Florida's resign-to-run law says that if a state or local elected official qualifies for a federal election and fails to turn in a letter at qualifying, the official is automatically forced to resign.

Hugh Ferrell, the lawyer representing Hill, maintains that Harris did not follow this law when she remained on the job as secretary of state for two weeks.

She did not make a "good faith" effort to follow the law, Ferrell told the judge.

But Ferrell also said that the federal loyalty oath signed by Harris does not follow Florida's resign-to-run law and is a "false oath."

He said the Division of Elections had unilaterally chosen to give the form to federal candidates over the last six years even though the law states otherwise.

Ferrell told Davey that if he did not remove Harris from the ballot then anyone could deceive the public and use their current state elected office to help them with a bid for federal office.

Donna Blanton, who represented Harris during the presidential recount battle in 2000 and once again on Thursday, argued that Harris had done nothing improper that warranted her removal from the ballot. She said Hill was just trying to find a way to win the election.

"He's asking for you to declare his client the winner of the primary," Blanton said of Ferrell's arguments.

Blanton also pointed out that the current law was designed to deal with court rulings that said the state's resign-to-run law could not apply to federal candidates. The provision was placed into law in 1983 shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a Texas law that called for an automatic resignation.

She also cited a state appeals court ruling in 1994 over eligibility involving current Secretary of State Jim Smith. Smith ran for governor that year and came in second to Bush in the primary. Smith dropped out of the race before the runoff election and then took the place of a Republican candidate for agriculture commissioner challenging incumbent Bob Crawford.

Crawford contended Smith could not qualify for two offices in the same election year. But the appeals court said that while there was doubt about whether Smith followed the law, the court ruled that "doubt should be resolved in favor of holding a free and competitive election."

"Imagine, government actually getting rid of, not adding, offices."

The job will still be there, the change is the Governor appoints the Secretary of State. Too bad, as one of the things the Florida Constitution had right was making the Governor weak and the Cabinet strong. Just chalk the change, vigorously supported by Governor Bush, up as another victory for big government fans.

Is it true that there were two penalties for failure to comply with the requirement that a candidate resign upon qualification for office? The first was the automatic removal from office. The second as I recall was that an elector(voter) in the district where the candidate was to have run could petition the Secretary of State or Circuit Court for the Candidate's removal from the ballot. Once removed the candidate could still run, but as a write-in. I feel sure that I read this earlier on but there has been no mention of it lately. Am I mistaken or is the second provision the one Hill is attempting to enforce? If he is successful just how can Harris run as a write-in when her name is on the ballot? That will take the mother of all voter education campaigns.

Oh no! It's the infamous "red X" again! $;-)

Was this what you meant to post?

Naw, I was going with the book cover, but that pic is just as good.

Red X, eh? I copied the address straight off of a picture on another Freep thread. Oh well.

I liked the other cover better. Now they'll lampoon the book as a puff piece because she looks very pretty on the cover. (Maybe thats the softcover version?)

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