BREAKING: Appeals Court Tosses Rahm Off Ballot

F-Bombs for everyone!

Via "Just Karl"

Full Decision: Thanks to Gabe.

Basics of Decision [ace]: Two statutes discuss residency, one for voter eligibility and one for candidate eligibility. Voter eligibility can be proven by "constructive" residency-- that is, you're not really residing in the area, but you maintain a home there and intend to return to it. This is a more lenient standard.

Another statute requires a candidate to "reside in" an area (Chicago, here) for a full year before seeking to be eligible to hold office there.

Rahm Emmanuel argues, basically, these statutes say the exact same thing and the test of whether or not he's a candidate should be the exact same as the test for determining if he can cast a valid vote for a candidate.

The court finds that's not right, because, in the test for candidate eligibility, it specifies first that the candidate must be eligible to cast a vote and, further, that he must "reside in" Chicago for a year before the election. The court finds it makes no sense if that Part 2 of the test simply means the exact same thing as the Part 1; it must mean something different, they figure, since the test consists of two separate parts.

So they find that second part requires genuine, bona fide residency and not mere "constructive" residence for voting purposes. And there they find Emmanuel fails the test, easily. He clears Part 1 of the test (he can vote there, because he has constructive residence there) but not Part 2, which requires, they say, actual residency. Or else, again, why have a Part 2 at all?

posted by DrewM. at 01:01 PM

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