Justia Election Law Opinion Summaries

Plaintiffs claimed that West Virginia's 2011 congressional redistricting plan violated the "one person, one vote" principle that the Court held to be embodied in Article I, section 2, of the United States Constitution. A three-judge District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia agreed, declaring the plan "null and void" and enjoining West Virginia's Secretary of State from implementing it. The state defendants appealed directly to the Court. Because the District Court misapplied the standard for evaluating such challenges set out in Karcher v. Daggett, and failed to afford appropriate deference to West Virginia's reasonable exercise of its political judgment, the Court reversed. View "Tennant v. Jefferson County" on Justia Law

Montana state law provides that a "corporation may not make ... an expenditure in connection with a candidate or a political committee that supports or opposes a candidate or a political party." Mont. Code 13–35–227(1). The Montana Supreme Court rejected a claim that the statute violated the First Amendment. The Supreme Court reversed the Montana decision, based on its 2010 decision, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, in which the Court struck down a similar federal law, holding that "political speech does not lose First Amendment protection simply because its source is a corporation." Dissenting Justices Breyer, Ginsburg, Sotomayor, and Kagan stated that "Montana’s experience, like considerable experience elsewhere since the Court’s decision in Citizens United, casts grave doubt on the Court’s supposition that independent expenditures do not corrupt or appear to do so." View "Am. Tradition P'ship, Inc. v. Bullock" on Justia Law

California law permits public employees to create an agency shop bargaining unit so that all employees are represented by a union. Employees who do not join must pay "chargeable expenses;" the union may not require nonmembers to fund ideological projects. In 2005, SEIU, a public-sector union, sent its annual "Hudson notice," setting and capping monthly dues, and stating that the fee could increase without notice. That month, the Governor called for a special election on propositions opposed by SEIU. After the 30-day objection period, SEIU sent a letter announcing a temporary 25% dues increase and elimination of the cap: an "Emergency Temporary Assessment to Build a Political Fight-Back Fund." Nonmembers could not avoid paying. The district court entered summary judgment favoring a class of nonmembers who paid into the fund. The Ninth Circuit reversed, employing a balancing test: whether procedures reasonably accommodated interests of the union, the employer, and nonmember employees. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that the case is not moot, despite SEIU offering a refund. When a state establishes an agency shop that exacts union fees as a condition of public employment, dissenting employees are forced to support an organization with whose principles they may disagree. Compulsory subsidies for private speech are subject to exacting First Amendment scrutiny and cannot be sustained unless there is a comprehensive regulatory scheme and compulsory fees are a necessary incident of the larger regulatory purpose that justified the required association. When a union imposes a special assessment or dues increase to meet undisclosed expenses, it must provide fresh notice and may not exact funds without consent. Failure to provide a fresh Hudson notice was unjustified; treatment of nonmembers who opted out after the initial Hudson notice also ran violated the First Amendment. They were required to pay 56.35% of the special assessment even though all the money was slated for electoral uses. View "Knox v. Serv. Emps. Int'l Union Local 1000" on Justia Law

The 2010 census showed an enormous increase in Texas' population which required the State to redraw its electoral districts for the United States Congress, the State Senate, and the State House of Representatives, in order to comply with the Constitution's one-person, one-vote rule. The State also had to create new districts for the four additional congressional seats it received. Plaintiffs subsequently brought suit in Texas, claiming that the State's newly enacted electoral plans violated the United States Constitution and section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. 1973. The Court held that because it was unclear whether the District Court for the Western District of Texas followed the appropriate standards in drawing interim maps for the 2012 Texas elections, the orders implementing those maps were vacated, and the cases were remanded for further proceedings. View "Perry v. Perez" on Justia Law

The Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Act (matching funds provision), Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. 16-940 et seq., created a voluntary public financing system to fund the primary and general election campaigns of candidates for state office. Petitioners, candidates and independent expenditure groups, filed suit challenging the constitutionality of the matching funds provision. The Court held that the matching funds provision substantially burdened the speech of privately financed candidates and independent expenditure groups without serving a compelling state interest where the professed purpose of the state law was to cause a sufficient number of candidates to sign up for public financing, which subjected them to the various restrictions on speech that went along with that program. Therefore, the Court held that the matching funds scheme violated the First Amendment and reversed the judgment of the Ninth Circuit. View "Arizona Free Enterprise Club's Freedom Club PAC, et al. v. Bennett, et al; McComish, et al. v. Bennett, et al." on Justia Law

Petitioner administered and enforced Nevada's Ethics in Government Law, Nev. Rev. Stat. 281A.420, and investigated respondent, an elected official who voted to approve a hotel/casino project proposed by a company that used respondent's long-time friend and campaign manager as a paid consultant. Petitioner concluded that respondent had a disqualifying conflict of interest under section 281A.420(8)(e)'s catch-all provision and censured him for failing to abstain from voting on the project. At issue was whether legislators have a personal, First Amendment right to vote on any given matter. The Court held that the Nevada Ethics in Government Law was not unconstitutionally overbroad where the law prohibited a legislator who had a conflict both from voting on a proposal and from advocating its passage or failure; where a universal and long-established tradition of prohibiting certain conduct created a strong presumption that the prohibition was constitutional; and where restrictions on legislators' voting were not restrictions on legislators' protected speech because the legislator's vote was the commitment of his apportioned share of the legislature's power to the passage or defeat of a particular proposal and the legislative power thus committed was not personal to the legislator but belonged to the people. The Court also concluded that additional arguments raised in respondent's brief were not decided or raised in his brief in opposition and were thus considered waived. Accordingly, the Court reversed the judgment of the Nevada Supreme Court and remanded the case for further proceedings. View "Nevada Commission on Ethics v. Carrigan" on Justia Law

Claiming that he was subjected to dirty tricks during his successful campaign to become the police chief of Vinton, La., plaintiff filed a state court suit against the incumbent chief and the town (collectively, "defendant") asserting both state and federal law claims. Defendant removed the case to federal court based on plaintiff's 42 U.S.C. 1983 claims and after discovery, defendant sought summary judgment on the federal claims, which plaintiff conceded were not valid. The District Court accordingly dismissed the federal claims with prejudice and remanded the remaining claims to state court, noting that defendant's attorneys' work could be useful in the state court proceedings. Defendant then asked the federal court for attorney's fees. At issue was whether a court could grant reasonable fees to defendant when plaintiff's suit involved both frivolous and non-frivolous claims. The Court held that, when a plaintiff's suit involved both frivolous and non-frivolous claims, a court could grant reasonable fees to defendant, but only for costs that defendant would not have incurred but for the frivolous claims. The Court concluded that, although the District Court noted the usefulness of the attorneys' work in defending against the state law claims, it failed to take proper account of the overlap between the frivolous and non-frivolous claims; the District Court's reasoning that the close relationship between the federal and state law claims supported the award could not be squared with the congressional policy of sparing defendant from the costs only of frivolous litigation; and the Fifth Circuit did not uphold the award on proper ground where it seemed to think that defendant could receive fees for any work useful to defendant against a frivolous claim, even if his lawyers would have done that work regardless. Accordingly, the court vacated and remanded for further proceedings. View "Fox v. Vice" on Justia Law