Co. Const. art. XXI, § 3 — Article XXI / Section 3
CO Const., Article XXI, Section 3
Status: in_force

Resignation - filling vacancy. If such officer shall offer his resignation, it shall be accepted, and the vacancy caused by such resignation, or from any other cause, shall be filled as provided by law; but the person appointed to fill such vacancy shall hold his office only until the person elected at the recall election shall qualify. If such officer shall not resign within five days after the sufficiency of the recall petition shall have been sustained, the governor shall make or cause to be made publication of notice for the holding of such election, and officers charged by law with duties concerning elections shall make all arrangements for such election, and the same shall be conducted, returned and the result thereof declared in all respects as in the case of general elections. On the official ballot at such elections shall be printed in not more than 200 words, the reasons set forth in the petition for demanding his recall, and in not more than three hundred words there shall also be printed, if desired by him, the officer's justification of his course in office. If such officer shall resign at any time subsequent to the filing thereof, the recall election shall be called notwithstanding such resignation. There shall be printed on the official ballot, as to every officer whose recall is to be voted on, the words, "Shall (name of person against whom the recall petition is filed) be recalled from the office of (title of the office)?" Following such question shall be the words, "Yes" and "No", on separate lines, with a blank space at the right of each, in which the voter shall indicate, by marking a cross (X), his vote for or against such recall. On such ballots, under each question, there shall also be printed the names of those persons who have been nominated as candidates to succeed the person sought to be recalled; but no vote cast shall be counted for any candidate for such office, unless the voter also voted for or against the recall of such person sought to be recalled from said office. The name of the person against whom the petition is filed shall not appear on the ballot as a candidate for the office. If a majority of those voting on said question of the recall of any incumbent from office shall vote "no", said incumbent shall continue in said office; if a majority shall vote "yes", such incumbent shall thereupon be deemed removed from such office upon the qualification of his successor. If the vote had in such recall elections shall recall the officer then the candidate who has ​ received the highest number of votes for the office thereby vacated shall be declared elected for the remainder of the term, and a certificate of election shall be forthwith issued to him by the canvassing board. In case the person who received the highest number of votes shall fail to qualify within fifteen days after the issuance of a certificate of election, the office shall be deemed vacant, and shall be filled according to law. Candidates for the office may be nominated by petition, as now provided by law, which petition shall be filed in the office in which petitions for nomination to office are required by law to be filed not less than fifteen days before such recall election. Source: Initiated 12: Entire article added, effective January 22, 1913, see L. 13, p. 674. Editor's note: In In re Interrogatories Propounded by Governor Hickenlooper, 2013 CO 62, 312 P.3d 153, the Colorado Supreme Court held that the provision permitting a vote for a successor candidate in a recall election to be counted only if the elector also cast a ballot for or against the recall issue conflicts with the first and fourteenth amendments to the United States Constitution.