Opinion ID: 1254428
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: standing registered voter

Text: The State argues that a registered voter is not sufficiently affected by the statutes because the statutes do not deprive the voter of his right to vote in the election but merely provide that a district judge or a supreme court justice cannot be one of those candidates for whom the voter can cast his ballot. To create standing in a registered voter, the State argues, three conditions must be met: (1) a sitting district judge or supreme court justice must declare that he would run for another judicial office; (2) the judge must decline to file because of the automatic resignation provisions of sections 3-1-607 and 3-1-608, MCA; and (3) the voter must declare his intent to vote for that particular person. Absent these conditions, the State argues that the injury to the registered voter is too speculative. Where the public and the electorate were so clearly intended to benefit by a constitutional provision, we hold that a registered voter has standing to assert that public interest by contending that the constitutional provision has been the victim of legislative strangulation. The 1972 constitutional delegates, in considering what is now Art. VII, § 10, of the judicial article, were primarily motivated by the public interest to be served by permitting district judges to run for the Supreme Court and for a justice of the supreme court to run for chief justice  without having to forfeit their judicial office. The concern of the delegates was not to confer benefits on the judiciary nor on individual members of the judiciary. Rather, their concern was for the health of the judicial system itself  for the public interest. At the time of the 1972 Constitutional Convention, section 3-1-607, MCA (formerly section 93-219, R.C.M. 1947) was in effect, and it appears that the delegates in charge of the judicial article favored a prohibition similar to the statute. The original proposal required district judges and supreme court justices to resign from office if they filed for any elective office other than their own. The original provision submitted to the full convention, provided in part: Filing for another elective office results in forfeiture of judicial position ... (Tr. 1972 Constitutional Convention, Vol. I at 512.) However, several delegates immediately questioned the wisdom of this provision once they learned that it was intended to prevent district judges from running for the supreme court and supreme court justices from running for chief justice  unless they resigned from office. (Tr. 1972 Constitutional Convention, Vol. IV, at 1148-1158.) Several delegates argued that the judicial system would benefit by enabling district court judges and supreme court justices to run for judicial office other than their own without forfeiting their own office. (Tr. 1972 Constitutional Convention, Vol. IV at 1149.) Based on these arguments, the article was amended to reflect that thinking. The first version of the amendment that was voted on was more precise but longer than the version finally adopted. The first version provided in part that Filing for another elective public office results in forfeiture of a judicial position, but a judge may file for another judicial position without forfeiture of the judicial position he holds. (Tr. 1972 Montana Constitutional Convention, Vol. IV at 1149.) With no debate this version was voted on and passed by a vote of 88 to 2. This version was then sent to the style and drafting committee for final revision as to form. The final version came out of the style and drafting committee, changed as to form only, and with no further debate on the merits, the delegates voted to adopt this version, which is now part of our 1972 Constitution. The integrity and supremacy of this provision is the basis for the case now before us. It reads: Any holder of a judicial position forfeits that position by either filing for an elective office other than a judicial position or absenting himself from the state for more than sixty (60) consecutive days. (Art. VII, § 10.) This constitutional provision was motivated by the belief of the delegates that the public interest would be served by a provision that would permit judges to seek various levels of judicial office through the elective process without first suffering a forfeiture of their own office. We must, therefore, recognize that a public interest exists, apart from the desires of individual district judges or supreme court justices, to assert the integrity and supremacy of this constitutional provision voted on and passed by the delegates and later voted on and ratified by the people of this state. We hold that a registered voter has the standing to make this assertion. Standing questions cannot often be decided by hard and fast rules because of the varying complexity and importance of questions that come before the courts. We recognized in Stewart v. Board of County Commissioners of Big Horn County (1977), 175 Mont. 197, 573 P.2d 184, that standing questions must be viewed in part in light of discretionary doctrines aimed at prudently managing judicial review of the legality of public acts ... 175 Mont. at 200, 573 P.2d at 186. Where discretion is involved hard and fast rules cannot be the decisive factors. The importance of the question to the public surely is an important factor, and this is why in State ex rel. Sego v. Kirkpatrick (1974), 86 N.M. 359, 524 P.2d 975, the New Mexico Supreme Court recognized that private parties should be granted standing to contest important public issues. The Court said: [T]his court in its discretion, may grant standing to private parties to vindicate the public interest in cases presenting issues of great public importance. Sego, supra, 524 P.2d at 979. The Sego case involved the validity of a partial veto exercised by the governor of New Mexico. The court granted standing to petitioner, as an elector and taxpayer, to contest the legality of the governor's action. See also State ex rel. Howard v. Oklahoma Corporation Commission (Okl. 1980), 614 P.2d 45, where the Oklahoma Supreme Court, relying in part on the Sego case, looked mostly to private citizen petitioners to grant standing to assert that a state commission had failed to comply with an Oklahoma statute. In Howard, the petitioners sought and obtained a peremptory writ of mandamus compelling the state commission to comply with the Oklahoma statute. Nor should we ignore the rights of citizens to assert the public interest in challenging the legality of legislative action that allegedly flies in the face of our state constitution. That is particularly so where the constitutional provision is intended to benefit the public as a whole rather than classes of individuals  such as judges. The constitutional provision invoked here was not intended to confer special privileges on the judiciary or on individual judges. Rather, it was intended to give the public a potentially broader choice in exercising its constitutional right to vote for judicial candidates. This Court has been keenly sensitive to the constitutional rights of voters. Although the case is not in point factually or legally, we clearly recognized in Jones v. Judge (1978), 176 Mont. 251, 577 P.2d 846, that a special interest exists in a registered voter whose vote may be denied by legislation. We said: The right to vote, however, is a personal and constitutional right. Although statute as an elector will generally not allow an individual to bring an action invoking the judicial power, an elector who is denied this right is sufficiently affected to invoke the judicial power to challenge the validity of the Act which denies him the right. 176 Mont. at 254, 577 P.2d at 848. In Jones the right of registered voters to vote for judicial candidates was completely denied by operation of the challenged statutes. Here the registered voters would not be completely denied their right to vote for judicial candidates running for the offices that are open to the elective process this year. But the operation of the challenged statutes does deny the voters their right to vote for a class of judicial candidates that allegedly is expressly permitted by Art. VII, § 10, of our Constitution to be candidates for other judicial offices. Unlike Jones, the registered voters here, in addition to asserting their constitutional right to vote, are asserting their constitutional supremacy of a provision that expressly opens the judicial elective process to all judges who would file for another office  without suffering forfeiture of their own office. At a minimum, the right of registered voters to vote for judicial candidates coming from the ranks of judges, would be diminished. Practically speaking, the right would be effectively denied. Rare is the judicial candidate who would forfeit his judicial office by running for another judicial office. The constitutional delegates clearly intended the Montana electorate to be the beneficiaries of a judicial elective process permitting all judges to file for other judicial office provided they are otherwise qualified. The challenged statutes have not only chilled that process, they have essentially frozen that process by making it a virtual certainty that judges would not run for other judicial office at the risk of automatic forfeiture of their office by the mere act of filing for other judicial office. The electorate has been effectively denied a right to a potentially broader selection of judicial candidates. Just as clearly, a registered voter must be recognized as having the standing to assert that the challenged statutes have diminished his constitutional right to vote.