Opinion ID: 2204603
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Repeal of the Primary Threshold Law

Text: Petitioners first argue that the primary threshold law is no longer in effect because it was repealed by the 1996 Legislature in Act of Apr. 2, 1996, ch. 419, § 9, 1996 Minn. Laws 982. [9] Section 9 provides: Minnesota Statutes 1994, section 204D.10, subdivision 2, is repealed. That section clearly espouses the legislature's intent to repeal the primary threshold law. The secretary of state contends that this repeal expired by the operation of section 10 of the 1996 Act, so that the primary threshold law remains applicable today. Section 10 of the 1996 Act provided that the amendments made by the act would expire if a particular decision of the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals were reversed. Section 10 provided: This act is effective for the state primary election in 1996 and thereafter. The amendments made by this act are suspended during any time that the decision of the eighth circuit court of appeals in Twin Cities Area New Party v. McKenna, No. 94-3417MN, is stayed or the mandate of the court is recalled. If the McKenna decision is reversed, the amendments made by this act expire and the prior law is revived. The purpose of this paragraph is to provide an orderly procedure for complying with the McKenna decision while retaining the prior law prohibiting simultaneous nominations to the extent permitted by the United States Constitution. 1996 Act, § 10, 1996 Minn. Laws at 982 (emphasis added). The Eighth Circuit McKenna decision referenced in section 10 had struck down the Minnesota statute that prohibited candidates from appearing on the ballot as the nominee of more than one party. Sections 2 through 8 of the 1996 Act amended Minnesota election laws to comply with the mandate of the Eighth Circuit decision to allow multi-party candidacies. Id., §§ 2-8, 1996 Minn. Laws at 979-82. At the time the 1996 Act was enacted, the McKenna case was still pending in the United States Supreme Court under the name of Timmons v. Twin Cities Area New Party . In April 1997, the Supreme Court reversed the Eighth Circuit decision, Timmons v. Twin Cities Area New Party, 520 U.S. 351, 117 S.Ct. 1364, 137 L.Ed.2d 589 (1997), triggering the expire-and-revive language of section 10. Petitioners argue that the repeal of the primary threshold law by the 1996 Act did not expire with the reversal of McKenna in Timmons because section 10 states that only the amendments made by the Act expire, and section 9 was not an amendment, but a repealer. Petitioners contend that the plain language of the 1996 Act compels this conclusion because sections 2 through 8 each provides that a particular statute is amended, whereas section 9 refers only to repeal. Further, petitioners argue that section 9 served an entirely different purpose than the preceding sections of the 1996 Act, all of which dealt with the issue of multi-party candidacies, whereas section 204D.10, subd. 2, and its repeal have nothing to do with multi-party candidacies. Petitioners assert that because the primary threshold law had nothing to do with multi-party candidacies, there was no reason to revive it based on the reversal in Timmons, as there was for the statutes amended by the 1996 Act. Petitioners argue that further evidence that the primary threshold law was permanently repealed is (1) that the primary threshold law was not applied in the 2000 elections, (2) that the legislature has made no provision for post-primary nomination by petition, even though the nomination process is expressly mentioned in the primary threshold law, and (3) that the primary threshold law has been preempted by an entirely new system of campaign financing and regulation of political parties and ballot access. The secretary of state argues that the primary threshold law remains in effect because its repeal by the 1996 Act was expired by the reversal of McKenna in Timmons. The secretary of state asserts that the section 9 repealer was part of the amendments made in the 1996 Act and that the primary threshold law was encompassed in the revival of the prior law provided for in section 10 in the event of McKenna's reversal. The keystone of the secretary of state's argument that the primary threshold law remains in effect is that the legislature amended the primary threshold law in 2003. See Act of May 27, 2003, ch. 112, art. 2, § 50(a), 2003 Minn. Laws 680. The 2003 amendment deleted the phrase state treasurer from the primary threshold law as part of broader legislation eliminating that state office. The secretary of state contends that the 2003 amendment, as well as two previous legislative attempts to amend the primary threshold law after 1996, demonstrate that the legislature did not think the subdivision had been permanently repealed in 1996.