Opinion ID: 6986373
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: the need for ' certification

Text: Certification is justified by reason of the absence of authoritative state court interpretations of the election statutes at issue here, the importance of the issue to the state election process, the likelihood that the question -will recur, the seeming conflict between the statutory interpretation of the City Board and the State Board of Elections, and the capacity of certification to resolve the most critical phase of this litigation. The resolution of the federal questions presented clearly hinges on a “determinative question[ ] of New York law on which [the New York Court of Appeals] has not previously spoken,” Tunick v. Safir, 94 N.Y.2d 709, 711, 709 N.Y.S.2d 881, 731 N.E.2d 597 (2000): whether a voter in a contested primary election in New York City (or elsewhere in the state) is entitled to have facilities available for write-in voting in the absence of a petition for opportunity to ballot. Local Rule § 0.27 permits us to certify to the State’s highest court any “unsettled and significant question of state law that will control the outcome of a case pending before this Court.” 2d Cir. R. § 0.27; see also N.Y. Comp.Codes R. & Regs. tit. 22, § 500.17(a) (2000) (permitting certification to the New York Court of Appeals of “determinative questions of New York law ... for which there is no controlling precedent of the Court of Appeals”). Because, applying these rules, we believe certification is appropriate in this case, we certify the following question to the New York Court of Appeals: “Is write-in voting available to an enrolled party voter in a contested primary election where no timely petition for opportunity to ballot has been filed?” H