By Richard Winger
Reprinted from Ballot Access News

On January 6, the South Carolina Supreme Court will hear Tempel v Platt, a case involving the Green Party’s attempt to place Eugene Platt on the November 2008 ballot as its candidate for the State House of Representatives, 115th district. The Green Party had nominated Platt by convention. Afterwards, that same year, Platt had run in the Democratic primary for that same seat (in June) and lost that primary.

The Democratic Party of South Carolina had then sued Platt, saying that by trying to be the Green Party nominee in November 2008, he was violating a pledged he signed when he entered the Democratic primary. The pledge, which is in section 7-11-210 of the election law, says if someone who lost a fight for a party nomination still tries to run for the same seat in November some other way, “the chairman of the party which held the primary shall forthwith institute an action in a court of competent jurisdiction for an order enjoining the person from so offering or campaigning in the general election.” See this story. Thanks to Dave Gillespie for the link.

This case is separate from Platt’s case pending in the 4th circuit, South Carolina Green Party v South Carolina Election Commission. That federal case argues that it is unconstitutional for South Carolina to keep a party nominee off the general election ballot if that same nominee later tries to get another party’s nomination and loses the fight for that second party’s nomination. All the briefs have been filed in the federal case, but no hearing date has been set.

One may read this post and wonder what the difference is in the two cases. The reason there are two cases is that Platt faced two legal barriers to being put on the November ballot as the Green Party nominee. First he placed the barrier of a state ballot access law, which is the subject of the federal case. Second, he faced the barrier that another state election law gives a party to power to sue someone who tries to run against the party’s nominee, if that person had first tried to obtain that party’s nomination and had failed to get it. That second law would even make it illegal for someone like that to run as a write-in candidate in November. All of these laws make little sense, given that South Carolina permits two parties to jointly nominate the same candidate. None of the other states that permit fusion place such landmines in the path of anyone who tries to use the fusion process.
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Decision will clarify rights of multiple-party candidates

By Yvonne Wenger
Reprinted from The Post and Courier

COLUMBIA — The future of candidates in South Carolina running under more than one party label will be decided after state Supreme Court justices rule on a case before them this week.

The American Civil Liberties Union is arguing the case on behalf of Eugene Platt, who tried to run in 2008 as a Green Party candidate for House District 115 after losing the Democratic Party nomination.

At odds in the case are South Carolina’s unusual election law that allows a candidate to represent more than one party on the ballot and the state’s “sore loser” statute that the Democratic Party said stops a candidate defeated for one party’s nomination from appearing on the ballot for another party.

The justices will hear the case at 9:30 a.m. Wednesday.

State Rep. Anne Peterson Hutto, a Democrat, represents District 115, and her seat in the Statehouse is not at stake. Action by the high court would provide clarity for future candidates.

Platt said he will run against Hutto for her seat in the 2010 election as a Green Party candidate.

Platt was denied a spot on the 2008 ballot after he lost the Democratic primary to Hutto. His case has been tied up in court since then.

“We’re optimistic, fellow Greens and I, that the state Supreme Court will rule on our behalf,” Platt said. “It is extremely gratifying that the preeminent institutional guardian of the Constitution, which is to say the ACLU, has taken up our case. Conversely, I can’t imagine the Democratic Party can be proud.”

A federal case on the same matter is pending before the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va.

The Charleston County Democratic Party, represented by local lawyer Truett Nettles, argues that the case comes down to a loyalty pledge that Platt signed when he sought that party’s nomination. The pledge states that the candidate agrees not to run in the general election against the Democratic nominee, Nettles said.

Platt said that he had the nominations from the Green Party and the Working Families Party prior to his bid in the Democratic primary. But, according to arguments in earlier court appearances, Platt first officially declared his candidacy as a Democrat.

Bryan Sells, senior staff counsel with the ACLU Voting Rights Project, said the case in state court is simple. Loyalty oaths long have been held to be unconstitutional, Sells said. The ACLU wants to protect the First Amendment, he said.

“His (Platt’s) defeat in the Democratic primary left the Green Party and Working Families Party without any candidate and it infringes on those parties’ First Amendment right,” Sells said.

Reach Yvonne Wenger at ywenger@postandcourier.com or 803-926-7855.