The real offense here is apparently that the county commission has highlighted a glaring omission in the law which is not their fault. They have exercised their discretion according to law by refusing to rubber stamp a process at their level. The existing law does not seem to preclude them from doing so. However, by doing so, their action resulted in lighting a fire under the state legislature to come up with a missing procedure— how to certify vote results at the county level. The political hacks at the state level apparently pulled some levers with the state supreme court to avoid confronting this problem head on (as a rational governing body might ordinarily do?).
from
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/certify
transitive verb
1: to attest authoritatively: such as
a: CONFIRM
b: to present in formal communication
c: to attest as being true or as represented or as meeting a standard
d: to attest officially to the insanity of
2: to inform with certainty : ASSURE
3: to guarantee (a personal check) as to signature and amount by so indicating on the face
4: to recognize as having met special qualifications (as of a governmental agency or professional board) within a field
agencies that certify teachers
A question is what is the value if any of certification if it is effectively no different from rubberstamping?
For example
Person A attests that the moon is made from green cheese
Person B is requested to certify that the moon is made from green cheese on the strength of the testimony of Person A
Person B refuses to certify that the moon is made from green cheese
Person C gets upset with Person B’s refusal and issues a writ of mandamus to force Person B to certify that the moon is made grom green cheese
If Person C prevails in the writ, then of what value is Person B’s certification? it seems to be reduced to zero since Person B’s discretion is entirely removed by the writ.
Going back to the definition, to certify is to attest authoritatively, to confirm. However, there is no real attestation or confirmation in rubberstamping.
The value that remains seems fraudent, that is the only conceivable value of a rubberstamp certification is in support of a claim that is fraudulent to begin with.