Opinion ID: 1752836
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Does the statute burden a candidate's right to vote? If so, how severe is the burden?

Text: Judge Hodges argues that section 162.015 restricts the right of a person who seeks access to the general election ballot to vote because the statute restricts a candidate to voting only in the primary of the party in which he wishes to be a candidate in the general election. Further, he argues that the section prohibits an independent candidate from voting in the primary of any party for any office. He also argues that the penalty imposed for violating this restriction is severe, namely, forfeiture of a nomination for public office. Judge Hodges asserts that the restriction is even more severe in his case because he is a twenty-year incumbent who was guaranteed reelection but will now be defrocked of his position and livelihood because of section 162.015(a)(2). According to Judge Hodges, this severe restriction on the right to vote warrants strict scrutiny and cannot survive unless it is narrowly tailored to serve a compelling state interest. Appellants counter that Judge Hodges misidentif[ies] the injury when he claims that section 162.015(a)(2) severely burdens his right to vote. Instead, Appellants argue, it is Judge Hodges's candidacy that is burdened because of his crossover voting. Because candidacy has never been deemed a fundamental right and the impact to Judge Hodges's right to vote is merely secondary and residual, the burden is less than severe and the statute is not subject to strict scrutiny. Accordingly, Appellants assert that the statute should be upheld if the restriction is reasonable and nondiscriminatory and can be justified by the State's important regulatory interests. The Supreme Court has recognized that [s]tates retain the power to regulate their own elections. Burdick, 504 U.S. at 433, 112 S.Ct. 2059. Common sense, as well as constitutional law, compels the conclusion that government must play an active role in structuring elections; as a practical matter, there must be a substantial regulation of elections if they are to be fair and honest and if some order, rather than chaos, is to accompany the democratic processes. Id. (citations omitted). The Court has also stated: Election laws will invariably impose some burden upon individual voters. Each provision of a code, whether it governs the registration and qualifications of voters, the selection and eligibility of candidates, or the voting process itself, inevitably affectsat least to some degreethe individual's right to vote and his right to associate with others for political ends.... Consequently, to subject every voting regulation to strict scrutiny and to require that the regulation be narrowly tailored to advance a compelling state interest ... would tie the hands of States seeking to assure that elections are operated equitably and efficiently. Id. (citation omitted). We agree with Appellants that candidacy is not a fundamental right. Benham v. Driegert, 853 F.Supp. 951, 953 (N.D.Tex.1994), aff'd, 38 F.3d 569 (5th Cir. 1994) (Courts have not recognized candidacy as a fundamental right, but instead have held that the existence of barriers to a candidate's access to the ballot does not of itself compel heightened scrutiny.). Every voter has a right to be a candidate for a public office if he possesses the qualifications required to fill the office. It does not necessarily follow that he can be the candidate of a particular political party. Roberts v. Cleveland, 48 N.M. 226, 149 P.2d 120, 121 (1944). Although there is no question that Judge Hodges was permitted to vote in the primary of his choice and did in fact do so, we disagree with Appellants that the statute imposed no direct burden on Judge Hodges's right to vote. Nevertheless, observing Burdick, we conclude that strict scrutiny is not required because the burden on Judge Hodges's right to vote is not severe. Section 162.015(a)(2) does not completely disenfranchise Judge Hodges, or any other candidate, from participating in the electoral process either as a voter or as a candidate. Rather, Judge Hodges is permitted to exercise freely his vote in the general election without regard to party affiliation or alignment. Section 162.015(a)(2) likewise does not and did not preclude Judge Hodges from voting in the party primary of his choice. Furthermore, section 162.015(a)(2) does not preclude Judge Hodges from running as a candidate in the general election except to the extent it requires him to be aligned with the party with whom he is affiliated. Such a requirement does not impose a severe burden on either his candidacy or his right to vote. Finally, neither section 162.015(a)(2) nor any other provision in the Election Code prohibits Judge Hodges from voting in the primary of his choice when he is not running for office or from changing his party affiliation each election cycle for purposes of voting in a party primary or running for public office. Instead, the restriction placed on Judge Hodges's right to vote is limited to a single election cycle and a specific voting actcrossover voting. Although we are not unsympathetic to Judge Hodges's situation, we hold that the burden on his right to vote is not severe and strict scrutiny is not warranted in this case. See Rosario v. Rockefeller, 410 U.S. 752, 93 S.Ct. 1245, 36 L.Ed.2d 1 (1973) (rejecting a constitutional challenge to New York's closed primary elections that required a potential voter to affiliate with a party at least eight months in advance of the primary to participate in the party's primary); Nader v. Schaffer, 417 F.Supp. 837, 850 (D.Conn.1976), aff'd, 429 U.S. 989, 97 S.Ct. 516, 50 L.Ed.2d 602 (1976) (rejecting a claim that Connecticut's closed primary election system is an unconstitutional burden on the right to vote). But see Kusper v. Pontikes, 414 U.S. 51, 94 S.Ct. 303, 38 L.Ed.2d 260 (1973) (striking down an Illinois law that prohibited a voter from voting in a political party's primary if he had voted in any other party's primary in the preceding twenty-three months because the statute effectively locked voters into a particular party affiliation for nearly two years and required them to abstain from voting in any primary for two years to break the lock).