Opinion ID: 576719
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Duke's Claim of Infringement of His Right of Association

Text: 20 Duke first claims that the Committee's decision excluding him from the ballot infringed his right of association. In effect, Duke argues that he has a right to associate with an unwilling partner, the Republican Party. See Belluso v. Poythress, 485 F.Supp. 904, 912 (N.D.Ga.1980). 21 As the discussion below demonstrates, the Republican Party enjoys a constitutionally protected freedom which includes the right to identify the people who constitute this association that was formed for the purpose of advancing shared beliefs and to limit the association to those people only. See Democratic Party of U.S. v. Wisconsin, 50 U.S. 107, 101 S.Ct. 1010, 1019, 67 L.Ed.2d 82 (1981). The necessary corollary to this is that Duke has no right to associate with the Republican Party if the Republican Party has identified Duke as ideologically outside the party. In cases where a voter has urged a right to vote in a party primary, the Supreme Court has stated that a nonmember's desire to vote in the party's affairs is overborne by the countervailing and legitimate right of the party to determine its own membership qualifications. Tashjian, 107 S.Ct. at 549 n. 6. The same rationale is also applicable in the instant case. Despite Duke's desire to be slated on the ballot as a Republican, we find that appellees did not infringe his right of association because the Republican Party legitimately exercised its right to identify the people who constitute the association, and to limit the association to those people only. Wisconsin, 101 S.Ct. at 1019. 22