states constitution grants the state's broad authority to regulate their elections exercising that authority tennessee an activist actually that requires st time voters registered to vote by mail to appear in person and present proof of identification st time that th statue works in conjunction with many of tennessee's other election laws to further the state's compelling interest intellect and integrity but despite that compelling interest and despite the broad authority granted by the constitution the district court below issued a preliminary injunction barring the state ability article three of the constitution limits federal courts to deciding only in case only cases and controversies now this bedrock requirement means that plaintiffs have to show standing and that means that their claims cannot be moved and i'll start with standing and note that federal courts are and the supreme court reiterated the score requirements just last week in carnegie adams and reiterated the importance of showing a demonstrated concrete interest in this and the outcome of the case and an organizational plaintiff that seeks to do this short of alleging  it by identifying a particular individual member who has suffered these sufficient injury to show standing in the court and at the preliminary injunction stage an organizational point of us to go beyond the allegations in the plants and introduce actual evidence that it credited versus i'm not sure your honor i think my understanding is in lyons and in lou dobbs the supreme court has endorsed that approach to me not explicitly but i think that's implied in their in their way that they typically look at standing but i think i think our position your honor is that those can't really stop aerated because because mr sweeney was the only basis of the association standing here they didn't identify any other member with standing and the district court's decision hinged solely on the alleged injury to mr sweet but if you're move this context your honor but i think it's important to remember that the plaintiff spare a heavy burden of showing that that exception does apply and here you know barring a scenario where mr sweet is rendered eligible to vote absentee by another state court injunction expanding absentee voting eligibility i don't see how we get to a similar scenario that we have here is again required that that acceptance context because the plaintiffs say you say that the that mr sweet and the plaintiffs have the burden of sharing this as and i were in the preliminary injunction context where a preliminary injunction was granted don't you have the burden of showing that it's moot at this point  organizational plaintiff's standing hinged on that of a single identified member but really that's where the similarities between this case and that one and because in that case the individual was actually a member when the complaint there was filed and did have standing at that time and beyond that is for recognize that he maintained a continued interest in the outcome of the case even though he didn't express a concrete interest of the time the injunction was executed and employment with the city of parma but that's clearly distinguishable from the situation here where it down there's no evidence in the record cleveland branch i think the broader point to make about why that case shouldn't control here is that as the court recognized just last year and right the spalding not everything in a in an opinion of this court is going to be binding on future panels and one of the points this court made and right the spalding you're looking at whether or not something is going to be binding on future panels of the court you have to see that from the record quote it must be clear that the court considered the issue and consciously reached a conclusion about it and i think the one branch certainly engaged with standing and didn't gauge with  think in support of our motion to dismiss because the plaintiff said i was ambivalent did the district judge talk about me not to any significant degree in his opinion that i can recall your honor so would one it's it we thought that there was some issue on this wooden approach be to remain and with instructions to the district court to consider this i think we would say that because the case given argument was moved at the time the injunction issued we would ask that th respect to them it's a done deal so i'm i'm i just don't understand how legitimate booter is with real concerns can raise a challenge to this provision if you're correct on this i think you honor i mean again i think i think it alleges a collection of members that might have standing in a future perhaps a matter for example that wasn't eligible to vote in this election but would be eligible in the next or something like that to expand the sort of thirty years i think you mentioned in your opening eleven justification you might expect the state to make for the statute is that you know if someone registers by mail and never physically shows up anywhere to every vote there's a chance of fraud no one's ever seen person in person they haven't seen him their signature in person lots of things that we traditionally do to verify voters at least once but your friendlier side says that you didn't raise that kind of argument in the district court and  as i understand i think we did reference throughout our brief both in respect to this particular law and the other strong selection laws that they do it for the state's compelling interest and election integrity and from protection and i think another thing to  were the district judge said and i believe that that there was a basis for the district judge saying this that he was not driven us he said that you raised only choose federal statutes one of which being the help america vote act which is what you're continuing to rely on and the other one the n b r e a which you're no longer reply and that those were the only reason he said that you had raised to support your position in the district court he did say your honor and again i think i think our position is of course that that was erroneous because as i've noted we did raise this throughout our briefing below i think if i if i ma quickly decide one point about the records before i conclude i think it's important to remember that we're we're not we're talking about two related terrorist here in the district court's decision it wasn't simply the district court decision not to know that we had raised anything about  there are multiple aspects of tennessee law in question so some of the evidentiary submissions went to one of interest mission might have gone to also all three sets for issues was was there a specific hearing just educated to this lames good morning your honour's and made it please the court my name is danielle lang and i represent a pelleas chatter this case overall is about whether a state can require that particular narrow categories of voters that itself has identified as having little to no opportunity to vote in person to do precisely that simply because they are voting for the st time and to do so without proffering any evidence that such a requirement furthers the state restriction based on the record of the arguments that were before it at the time and amid a global ongoing pandemic it did not as the state itself has recognized the coven nineteen pandemic and the quote has up ended nearly every facet of american life and elections are no exception and the district court certainly did not clearly error in considering the burdens created by coven nineteen in considering the burden for the st time voter restriction what about t able to was eligible to vote absentee under any circumstances at the time of the complaint was filed he was eligible to vote absent but at the time judge richardson issued the order on this particular issue he was not correct he may not have been in the and the question there is is commentary education in the records that he was no not at the time your hon because the the difficulty there is that as you approach an election you know the the injunction of course needs to be issued in time for it to be implemented pember you have until late october to apply for an absentee ballot and of course a number of the absentee eligibility criteria that exist are changing around in nature he was kind of deciding where he was going to go to school and so where he was going to be was in question whether or not quite frankly any of us were either ill or quarantined because of a coma nineteen exposure was a question we could not know in september as of november and in fact  hollingsworth was really about standing to appeal and if you look at lou how little money is exceptionally clear it says jurisdiction has to be a fast under the facts exist day when the complaint is filed of course there isn't a separate  jurisprudence around move which is often called standing set in time and we have a separate set of jurisdictional questions when it comes to me so i think if we separate as the defendant can i believe that there are several reasons for that your honor i one is that the organizational plaintiff here clearly had an ongoing injury the question is whether or not they have this kind of rotating revolving door issue when it comes to individual members and that's what cleveland and double a c p was trying to a draft when it said that just because one member loses their kind of concrete interest doesn't mean that the organization that's representing a much larger your honor the question here is whether or not the district court abused its discretion at the time that the engine injunction was granted the time that the preliminary injunction was briefed mr sweet had standing and he put there was voice in a month between the august this decision of the tennessee supreme court and the day on which judge richardson ruled on this particular aspect of the flight that's true your honor so once again i think we have to separate the questions of standing and when it comes to standing there is no question mr stamp mr sweet had standing when it comes to move this court has been exceptionally clear and i think that the re are three separate reasons why no should not apply but let's start with the easiest one which is capable of repetition yet of a to hear if you this court has been exceptionally clear that election cases are the quintessential application november you know voted and are no longer st time voters they would all become moot and you have this kind of constant revolving door as there is wait in that group of people who voted in november your honor since we have not done future or further record development in this case because it's been stalled during this appeal i cannot represent you for sure but i am certain he is but i can't represent to you for sure your honor and that's something that would certainly be developed going forward but that's why the capable of repetition yet evading review doctrine plainly applies and is the easiest way to address this case and the state has really not addressed the fact that the court has said that the  prong about whether or not it would apply to the plaintiffs in particular occurred to the plaintiff in particular simply does not apply to support to election law cases and that's something that not only  review doctrine does not apply but of course it's also very possible that this would likely recur to mr sweet mr sweet move to another county three registers and going to be out of town when an election happens but certainly capable of repetition yet evading review and it's certainly capable of repetition yet evading review for all of the other organizational members and one of the i want to know if you want to question about standing there he attended to he didn't say he was a member of a jail sometime down the road when he and his grandmother apparently said he was a member right that's correct your honor and you know in artful drafting of declaration that you know hurried litigation and clients that don't necessarily understand the kind of specifics of constitutional doctrine but he is the grand grandson of the president of the tennessee and double earlier whether or not there was a preliminary injunction hearing there wasn't one because the state did not request one they did not think that there were any factual issues here and they weren't concerned about the fact i did the question of factual determination by the district judge yes your honor absolutely he keep quite extensively i mean i think one of the strengths of the opinion below is that the district court was intensely familiar with the record  very closely and made a very specific factual finding based on the evidence that was put before him as to mr sweet membership and so that would be reviewed for clear error yes your honor and and when it goes to the state lack of kind of interest in developing the facts here i think that goes to the merits as well and there were a number of questions at the end of opposing counsel argument about what arguments were prepared that were presented to the court and quite frankly this was not a question of humility of evidence or kind of lack of clarity in the record about what evidence went to where there is a brief opposing the preliminary injunction that is broken down quite clearly by the state that i'm not sure that they could go to different claims most of the declarations were specifically aimed at the signature match claim and talked about the various processes that the individual counties had or what not there is you know the one declaration from the i lection minister goins is the only thing the state relies upon but that is clearly discussing at length the signature match policies and so once again to not add that for at any point reference the  st time voter requirement and of course the andersen burdick has requires at least some connection between any asserted interest and the actual restriction in question and there is no declaration that hides those two together whatsoever anywhere and you know even though the district court found that the state clearly have not raised any issue of fraud and there are two pages in a fifty seven dollars page brief developed to the merits on the st time voter create on a voter well this restriction only applies to folks who are otherwise eligible to vote absentee and importantly the state has said that it has identified the  or that it's eligibility criteria specifically focused on those who would be unable to vote person so by the state's own admissions it says we've created these criteria that are only for people who can't vote in person and then says constitutional right to vote absentee what there is a constitutional right to vote and what this court has said in maysville arose and several other cases is that you have to look at all opportunities to vote when considering that for the affected class question is that most voters that's true but for absentee voters that's a very little category in tennessee and it's elderly folks who can't really get aroused whether it be early or not it is question i had is this you know the state isn't going to create the pandemic so the state is not doing anything other than what it's done for twenty five years to you know limit the right to vote you would say and we have said i think in thomson that they still allowed to whether or not the burden was what was too high and innocent verdict by its nature is a fact specific analysis have to take into account the realities in the world in addition i mean  in addition to the state's own regime and so that's obvious in a case like obama for america where the court considered the positions of various voters and what circumstances they might be facing those are things that the state of course doesn't control thank you your honor so i would conclude by saying that it would it would violate both the supreme court and six circuit precedent to find that there was a lack of jurisdiction at the time that the preliminary injunction was granted mr sweet  it was not clear error to find that he had standing at the hands of the complaint was filed the capable of repetition yet evading review doctrine plainly applies as those pleas went and double a c p it makes sense  stamping it is a heavy burden on the defendant to show move i am and the supreme court has been very clear that an interest that would not be sufficient at the time of a complaint being filed is not the same as the lack of interest or the amount of interest necessary to escape for example the voluntary substation doctrine doctrine is a perfect example of that and on the merits you cannot find that the district court plainly erred its discretion or clearly air the district court considered the facts that were before it and the very limited record evidence before it the state didn't provide anything to connect the nd and rd prongs here which have to do with faith and trust and i'm tying those interest to the requirement it's important to remember here it is not the case that these voters did not have to provide identification indeed they were required after this injunction to provide identification through the mail as the help america vote act required for online registrants they had already done that through the d m v at a prior time and yet this restriction was being applied to  them without any explanation and quite frankly without any connection to the text of the facts and for those reasons the state did not use it discretion and granting a preliminary injunction the state will have plenty of opportunity to make its merits focus on standings i didn't get to cover as much in my previous speaking to the course i think is the question elicited during my final the other side's arguments i think we do we do of course need to look at standing at the time the amended complaint was filed  you're a close look at the record confirms that there is no record evidence showing that suite was a member on the day the amended complaint was filed as you well judge morris is correct isn't she that banding that aren't that couldn't bad be interpreted reasonably to mean that he's a member if there's an inference that's being drawn there there is your honor and i think our position is that the inference isn't enough because as i pointed out and this court recognized in footnote three of its opinion was cool at the preliminary injunction stage and has to show actual evidence in the record confirming that that an individual has standing and here that simply wasn't something the plaintiffs did as judge givens pointed out and as you just noted in your question the only record evidence of sweet standing at the time the injunction issued was that he occasionally at times and that's only after the injunction was there any additional evidence put forth and even that this judge regular noted i only noted that he member in the present tense and i think all of this indicates that there was no evidence whatsoever in the record showing suites membership on the date the amended complaint was filed in for that reason as well as the other thank you thank you both for your argument and the keys could be submitted