Opinion ID: 2600337
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Judges Must Vacate Their Seats Within Ninety Days.

Text: Having determined that the judges failed to file declarations of candidacy by the statutory deadline, we now consider the appropriate remedy. The superior court concluded that the forfeiture sanction would be inappropriate. It reasoned that because it had found that the judges' filing snafus would not impact the election process, the hardship that vacation would cause on both the judges personally as well as the constitutional retention election system and the electorate would be too severe. On appeal Judge Jeffery and Judge Nolan argue that, under Johnstone, [44] we should weigh the hardship of our remedy on the judges and on the electorate against the hardship caused to the public from the judges' failure to timely file their declarations of candidacy. They note the personal hardship that would be imposed on them if they were required to forfeit their offices. More importantly, they argue, the public was unharmed by their actions because it had ample time to consider whether to support or oppose their candidacies. They observe that the council: (a) treated the judges as candidates when it conducted surveys in early 2004, (b) held a public hearing on the judges in May 2004, (c) issued a press release announcing that it supported the judges' retention on July 26, and (d) listed the judges as candidates on its website many months before the election. The constitution states in part that a superior court judge's office becomes vacant ninety days after the election . . . for which he fails to file his declaration of candidacy to succeed himself. [45] The legislature mirrored this wording when it enacted the two statutes that regulate when a superior court or district court judge's office becomes vacant. [46] We interpret the Alaska Statutes according to reason, practicality, and common sense, taking into account the plain meaning and purpose of the law as well as the intent of the drafters. [47] The plain meaning of the constitution and the statutes is that vacation is the mandatory consequence for a judge's failure to file a declaration of candidacy. Johnstone can be differentiated from this case. In Johnstone we held that we were establishing a new principle of civil law. [48] We therefore analyzed the hardship to Judge Johnstone and the electorate to determine whether our holding should only apply prospectively. [49] If our holding had not established a new principle of law, however, in the sense that it had not overrule[d] prior law or decide[d] an issue of first impression, the threshold test for prospective application would not have been met [50] and our analysis of the hardship of our holding would not have been triggered. Here, the law is clear that, absent statutory ambiguity, strict compliance with election filing deadlines is required, [51] and the penalty for noncompliance is mandatory vacation of office. [52] We have no doubt that requiring Judge Jeffery and Judge Nolan to vacate their office will lead to personal hardship. This must seem like a bitter reward for years of extraordinary public service by both judges. But because we are not establishing a new principle of law by holding that the judges' failure to meet the filing deadline triggered the mandatory vacation sanction, our decision is constrained by the controlling legal principles. It was error to rule that the hardship to the judges and electorate precluded application of the forfeiture sanction. [53]