Opinion ID: 4510976
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Constitutional Context

Text: We now consider other constitutional provisions closely related to the Seventeenth Amendment. Portions of the Seventeenth Amendment Vacancy Clause appear in, or cross-reference, sections 2, 3, and 4 of Article I of the unamended Constitution. The meaning of identical, similar, or explanatory language in these provisions has the potential to bring the meaning of the Vacancy Clause into sharper focus. The Seventeenth Amendment Vacancy Clause specifically replaced the following language from Article I, section 3, of the unamended Constitution: . . . and if Vacancies happen by Resignation, or otherwise, during the Recess of the Legislature of any State, the Executive thereof may make temporary Appointments TEDARDS V. DUCEY 25 until the next Meeting of the Legislature, which shall then fill such Vacancies. U.S. Const. art. I, § 3, cl. 2, amended by U.S. Const. amend. XVII (hereinafter the Unamended Vacancy Clause). The Seventeenth Amendment Vacancy Clause nevertheless retains much of this language. 16 Most notably for our purposes, both Vacancy Clauses contain temporal limitations, including specifically that appointments be “temporary.” The Unamended Vacancy Clause provided two other express limitations: the trigger is limited to vacancies that happen “during the Recess of the Legislature of any State,” and the appointment lasts only “until the next Meeting of the Legislature, which shall then fill such Vacancies.” The Seventeenth Amendment Vacancy Clause, however, provides just one other express limitation: the appointment lasts only “until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct.” The Seventeenth Amendment Vacancy Clause thus has a broader reach than 16 We provide a blackline for easy comparison: . . . and if When Vacancies happen by Resignation, or otherwise in the representation of any State in the Senate, during the Recess of the Legislature of any State, the executive authority of such State shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, That the legislature of any State may empower the Executive thereof may to make temporary Appointments until the next Meeting of the Legislature, which shall then people fill such the Vacancies by election as the legislature may direct. See U.S. Const. amend. XVII para. 2; id. art. I § 3, cl. 2 (additions in underline, omissions in strikethrough) (capitalization differences omitted). 26 TEDARDS V. DUCEY the Unamended Vacancy Clause, in that it applies throughout a Senate term. It is also more ambiguous than the Unamended Vacancy Clause, in that meetings of the state legislature occurred on regular schedules, whereas a popular vacancy election would not necessarily coincide with a regularly scheduled event. Plaintiffs argue that the Seventeenth Amendment’s reference to “temporary appointments” invokes a precise temporal meaning that this phrase had in the Unamended Vacancy Clause. Under the Unamended Vacancy Clause, a “temporary” appointment lasted no longer than the maximum interval between state legislative sessions. At the time that the Unamended Vacancy Clause was drafted, it appears that States held legislative sessions at least once a year. See Clopton & Art, supra, at 1211 n.119 (collecting state constitutions). As the Framers understood the provision, the maximum duration of a “temporary” appointment was thus one year. 17 See, e.g., S. Rep. No. 33385, at 1–2 (1854) (concluding that an appointed Senator’s right of representation had expired upon the closing of the next legislative session following appointment). However, at the time that the Seventeenth Amendment was drafted, 17 Indeed, delegates to the Philadelphia Convention doubted whether it was wise to entrust a Senate appointment power to State Governors at all, but their concerns were assuaged by assurances of this time constraint. See James Madison, Notes on the Debates in the Federal Convention, Aug. 9, 1787 (“Mr. WILSON objected to vacancies in the Senate being supplied by the Executives of the States. It was unnecessary as the Legislatures will meet so frequently. It removes the appointment too far from the people . . . . Mr. RANDOLPH thought it necessary in order to prevent inconvenient chasms in the Senate. In some States the Legislatures meet but once a year. As the Senate will have more power & consist of a smaller number than the other House, vacancies there will be of more consequence. The Executives might be safely trusted he thought with the appointment for so short a time.”) (emphasis added). TEDARDS V. DUCEY 27 many States held legislative sessions only every other year. Valenti v. Rockefeller, 292 F. Supp. 851, 864 (W.D.N.Y. 1968), summarily aff’d, 393 U.S. 405 (1969). The maximum duration of a “temporary” appointment then, assuming the permissible duration evolved with changing practice, 18 was therefore two years. These discrete time limits (one year or two years) are potential interpretations of the term “temporary” in the Seventeenth Amendment. 19 However, the Seventeenth Amendment’s omission of the very language from the Unamended Vacancy Clause that 18 The duration of actual interim appointments did grow longer. See Valenti, 292 F. Supp. at 864 (finding that 32 of 179 appointees between 1789 and 1913 served for more than one year); Clopton & Art, supra, at 1211 n.120 (reporting based on “the aid of modern technology and more accurate sources” that only 21 pre-Seventeenth Amendment appointees served longer than one year, only one of whose tenure occurred during the first fifty years after the unamended Constitution was ratified). 19 Plaintiffs also invite us to also interpret the term “temporary” to invoke a functional analogy between the Unamended Vacancy Clause’s reference to the “next Meeting of the Legislature,” and the Seventeenth Amendment Vacancy Clause’s reference to “the people fill[ing] the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct.” That is, the term “temporary” could carry over an implication that the election by the people to fill the vacancy must take place at the popular-election equivalent of the “next Meeting of the Legislature.” Plaintiffs argue that the people are always in session. Thus, the State must hold the vacancy election as quickly as it is able to hold an orderly special election. Other functional interpretations are also possible, however, such as that the people meet when they vote in elections. Thus, the State must hold the vacancy election no later than the next election at which the people of the state are voting, which is to say any statewide election, including a special election or odd-year election. Or, the people meet in their federal political capacity when they vote for congressional representatives. Thus, the State must hold the vacancy election no later than the next congressional election, which is to say the next even-year November election. 28 TEDARDS V. DUCEY gave the term “temporary” a precise temporal meaning suggests to us that such meaning was not retained. We think it more likely that the meaning retained by “temporary” was simply that an appointment does not definitively resolve a vacancy, but rather lasts only until the event that actually “fill[s]” the vacancy. Plaintiffs invite us to find further meaning in the language of the Seventeenth Amendment Vacancy Clause that duplicates language in the vacancy clause governing the House of Representatives (the House Vacancy Clause). The House Vacancy Clause states: When vacancies happen in the Representation from any State, the Executive Authority thereof shall issue Writs of Election to fill such Vacancies. U.S. Const. art. I, § 2, cl. 4. The Seventeenth Amendment materially replicates this language in the principal clause. 20 The House Vacancy Clause does not specify the amount of time that may permissibly elapse between the happening of a vacancy and the vacancy election. Given the two-year term of a Representative, however, we can deduce that any 20 We provide a blackline for easy comparison: When vacancies happen in the Representation from of any State in the Senate, the Executive Authority thereof of such State shall issue Writs of Election to fill such Vacancies.: Provided . . . See U.S. Const. amend. XVII para. 2; id. art. I, § 2, cl. 4 (additions in underline, omissions in strikethrough) (capitalization differences omitted). TEDARDS V. DUCEY 29 vacancy election must occur within a timeframe shorter than two years, and generally earlier than the next congressional election. 21 We note the judgment implicit in this requirement, that a special election is practicable on this shorter timeframe, and that a special election is worthwhile notwithstanding the limited duration of the remaining vacancy. Accord Valenti, 292 F. Supp. at 878 (Frankel, J., dissenting). However, we do not think the Seventeenth Amendment Vacancy Clause should be interpreted as referencing the precise time constraints that apply in the House context, for two reasons. First, the effect of a House vacancy is different from that of a Senate vacancy. When a vacancy occurs in the House, the affected district has no representation in the House until the State certifies a winner of the special election. The House Vacancy Clause contains no provision for an interim appointee. By contrast, when a vacancy happens in the Senate, the affected state is normally still represented by a second elected Senator, as well as potentially by an interim appointee. The election of a replacement Representative is thus in some sense more urgent than the election of a replacement Senator. Accord 21 Plaintiffs’ reliance on Jackson v. Ogilvie, 426 F.2d 1333 (7th Cir. 1970), and ACLU v. Taft, 385 F.3d 641 (6th Cir. 2004), for the proposition that the House Vacancy Clause requires a special election as soon as practicable is misplaced. Both of those cases were concerned with whether the House Vacancy Clause mandates a special election at all, even with little time left in the vacant term. See Jackson, 426 F.2d at 1334; ACLU, 385 F.3d at 644. Both held that it does, so long as the remaining time is not truly de minimis. See Jackson, 426 F.2d at 1337; ACLU, 385 F.3d at 650. Both held further that the lame-duck session is not de minimis. See Jackson, 426 F.2d at 1337; ACLU, 385 F.3d at 649 n.5. But neither pronounced a time constraint that would require a special election earlier than the next general election. 30 TEDARDS V. DUCEY ACLU, 385 F.3d at 649 n.3; Valenti, 292 F. Supp. at 862–63 (majority opinion). Conversely, however, the election of a replacement Senator is uniquely urgent in the sense that the Constitution prizes the equal representation of the States. See U.S. Const. art. V (“[N]o state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate.”). Second, as a practical matter, most States can likely conduct a special election more easily for a single congressional district than for an entire state. Most congressional districts are smaller than their entire states in terms of both geography and population. 22 Thus, House special elections generally require fewer polling places, fewer ballot materials, and a smaller elections staff. There may also be a smaller field of candidates, and candidates may be able to campaign more quickly. Accordingly, there is reason to think the Seventeenth Amendment Vacancy Clause may allow a longer interval before the people fill the vacancy by election than does the House Vacancy Clause. Accord Valenti, 292 F. Supp. at 862–63. Finally, Plaintiffs argue that the final words of the Seventeenth Amendment Vacancy Clause (“as the 22 Currently, seven states have only one congressional district: Alaska, Delaware, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont, and Wyoming. U.S. Census Bureau, Apportionment Population and Number of Representatives, by State: 2010 Census, https://www.census.gov/population/apportionment/files/Apportionment %20Population%202010.pdf. When the Seventeenth Amendment was ratified, five states had only one congressional district: Arizona, Delaware, Nevada, New Mexico, and Wyoming. Apportionment Act of 1911, Pub. L. No. 62-5, 37 Stat. 13 (1911). When the original Constitution was ratified, two of the thirteen original states were apportioned only one congressional district pending the first census: Delaware and Rhode Island. U.S. Const. art. I, § 2, cl. 3. TEDARDS V. DUCEY 31 legislature may direct”) are a cross-reference to the Elections Clause, which states: The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators. U.S. Const. art. I, § 4, cl. 1. We need not resolve this question, as we would disagree in any event with Plaintiffs’ argument that such a cross-reference independently imposes a time constraint on the vacancy election. Cf. United States v. Classic, 313 U.S. 299, 311 (1941) (“Pursuant to . . . [the Elections Clause] . . . , the states are given, and in fact exercise a wide discretion in the formulation of a system for the choice by the people of representatives in Congress.”). In sum, we do not find that related constitutional provisions place any precise temporal limitations upon vacancy elections or appointments under the Seventeenth Amendment.