Court Opinion

ID: 9580545
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:06:03.756767+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:36:21.161931
License: Public Domain

SUMMERS, Justice,
dissenting.
The contest filed in this municipal election is not governed by the statutory period for contests generally applicable to other types of elections provided by statute. I conclude that neither Article III nor Article V of our State Constitution require the result reached by the majority. The majority’s argument that interweaves the suffrage provisions of Article III to the anti-local law provision of Article V so as to require a uniform procedure for local elections is not a novel argument, and was rejected by courts more than a century ago. Thus, I respectfully dissent.
*188The majority claims that a municipal election is a “core state function” and that the election is “an exclusive nondelegable state function conducted by county election hoards under the supervisory authority of the Secretary of the State Election Board”, and that the election is in the hands of the State.1 I disagree.
In 1911 an argument was made to this Court that the Charter of the City of Oklahoma City was subservient to Legislative enactments that provided for the- time and conducting of elections. It was argued that Okla. Const. Art. Ill § 42 mandated such a result. In Lackey v. State ex rel. Grant, 29 Okl. 255, 116 P. 913 (1911) the Court said:
Counsel for relators urge that the portion of the foregoing section [Okla. Const. Art. Ill § 4] which provides that the Legislature shall provide the time of holding and conducting all elections, includes all elections held in municipal corporations, both special and general; and that since section 4 by its terms imposes a mandatory duty upon the Legislature to provide the time of holding such elections, that it precludes the power and right of any other body to fix a time for such elections.
Id. 116 P. at 918.
We then expressly stated that the Legislature’s duty under § 4 to provide for the time of holding and conducting elections applied only to elections held throughout the state, and not to municipalities.
Without determining whether, if section 4 did impose such duty upon the Legislature, the time of such elections could be fixed in any other manner than by an act of the Legislature, we are of the opinion that said section does not make it the mandatory duty of the Legislature to provide the time of holding elections in municipal corporations. Said section deals with three subjects: First. It provides that the Legislature shall create an election board. Second. That it shall provide the time and manner of holding and conducting all elections. Third. For the election by direct vote of the people of United States Senators, when the federal Constitution shall permit the same to be done. It is clear that the first and third objects intended to be accomplished by this section pertain to elections to be held throughout the state. It does not provide that the Legislature shall create election boards, but that it shall create “an election board.” The board here contemplated is a state board, under whose supervisions the elections of the state shall be conducted; and we think the second clause likewise has reference only to elections held throughout the state, and that would fall under the supervisions of said election board. Id. 116 P. at 918-919. (Emphasis added).
This Court thus determined in 1911 that the duty of the Legislature under Okla. Const. Art. Ill § 4 in providing for the time and manner of holding elections did not apply to the municipalities in general and *189to the City of Oklahoma City in particular. As explained in Lackey the Legislature was to create a State Election Board “under whose supervision the elections of the state shall be conducted”, but that such supervision does not turn a municipal election into a “state” election. In Art. Ill § 4 the phrase “and shall provide the time and manner of holding and conducting all elections ” was construed as not including municipal elections. (Emphasis added).
The majority’s construction of Art. Ill § 5 is correct in part but I disagree with its conclusion. Uniformity of election regulations between state and local elections is not constitutionally mandated. The constitution provides that all elections shall be free and equal.3 In Atwater v. Hassett, 27 Okl. 292, 111 P. 802 (1910) the Court explained the history of this provision by citing to opinions from other jurisdictions because of their similar constitutional provisions. Id. 111 P. at 804. Two of these opinions are noteworthy: Patterson v. Barlow, 60 Pa. 54 (1869) and People ex rel. Grinnell v. Hoffman, 116 Ill. 587, 5 N.E. 596, 8 N.E. 788 (1886). In Patterson the court explained that diversity, rather than uniformity, may be required to provide a free and equal election.
A free and equal election is the end, regulations to attain it are the means. If the end be attained, it is evident no question of constitutional law can arise on the uniformity or diversity of the regulations by which the end is reached. Of necessity, laws passed to promote a given object, must be controlled or modified by the circumstances surrounding the object, and must be framed to meet the exigencies standing in the way of the end to be reached. If uniformity of regulation be unsuited to different localities, the end must be attained by diversity. If in one part of the state a system secures to electors a free and equal election, but fails to secure it in another part because of the different circumstances, what principle of constitutional law makes it unlawful to enact other provisions to counteract the circumstances, and secure the true purpose of the Constitution? Good sense, good order and sound morality require this diversity of regulation when it secures the end; and it is a great fallacy to substitute uniformity of regulation for a free and equal election.
Patterson v. Barlow, 60 Pa. 54, 76 (1869). (Emphasis added). Later the same court stated “that uniform regulations are not enjoined [or required] by the Constitution is beyond all dispute." Id. 60 Pa. at 78. (Emphasis and explanation added). This concept was explained in the context of a “local or special law” challenge in People ex rel. Grinnell v. Hoffman, 116 Ill. 587, 5 N.E. 596, 8 N.E. 788 (1886):
It is said that the law is in conflict with that clause in the bill of rights which provides that “all elections shall be free and equal.” Const, art. 2, § 18. In order to support this position, it is assumed that the word “equal” means the same as the word “uniform,” and it is then argued that, inasmuch as the cities, towns, and villages which adopt the law will conduct elections according to its provisions, while those which do not adopt it will conduct them according to some other and different provisions, therefore there will be no uniformity, and in consequence no freedom or equality. The declaration in the bill of rights that all elections must be equal does not necessarily mean that there must be uniformity of regulation in regard thereto in all portions of the state. That the definition of “equal elections” does not include and involve the idea of uniformity in regulation is apparent from the considerations already presented upon the question of whether the law is general or special. It being the settled policy in this state, both under the constitutions of 1848 and of 1870, that general *190laws, whether upon the subject of elections or upon any other subject, may be in force in localities which vote to accept them, though not in force in localities which do not vote to accept them, it necessarily follows that there will be a want of uniformity between the law in force in the adopting locality and the law in force in the non-adopting locality.
Elections are free when the voters are subjected to no intimidation or improper influence, and when every voter is allowed to cast his ballot as his own judgment and conscience dictate. Elections are equal when the vote of every elector is equal in its influence upon the result to the vote of every other elector; when each ballot is as effective as every other ballot. Where an election for or against the same candidates, or for or against the same measure, takes place on the same day, in two different cities of the state, the fact that in one city the election officers make their returns to the city clerk, while in the other the returns are made to the county clerk, cannot possibly make any difference in the freedom or equality of the election. Cooley, in his work on Constitutional Limitations, classifies the provisions which usually occur in bills of rights. He places the declaration that “all elections shall be free and equal,” along with the declaration that “all freemen are equal,” in the first class of such provisions which he denominates “those declaratory of the general principles of republican government.” Cooley, Const. Lim. 45. It was never heard of as a general principle of republican government that the mode of conducting an election, and declaring its result, in one city, village, or town of a state shall be exactly the same as the mode pursued for the same purpose in every other city, village, or town in the state. This general declaration has reference to the rights of the individual voter. It does not refer to uniformity of election procedures in different communities.
Id. 5 N.E. at 600-601. (Emphasis in original and additional emphasis added).
In 1886 the Supreme Court of Illinois was able to say when construing a similar state constitutional provision that it was “unheard of” as a general principle that election procedures for municipal elections must be identical in different municipalities. The majority may, of course, listen to a voice other than that of the Grinnell Court, but the voice of historical interpretation long followed by this Court rejects the majority’s analysis.4
I also disagree with the majority’s conclusion that municipal charter provisions governing elections are unconstitutional as local or special laws and prohibited by Okla. Const. Art. V § 46. In City of Pond Creek v. Haskell, 21 Okl. 711, 97 P. 338 (1908) an argument was made that S.B. 234 [Okla.Sess.Laws 1907-1908 Chap. 31, Art. IV, at p. 378-387] was a special and local law for the opening and conducting of elections and for fixing and changing the place of elections, as its provisions applied to special elections to select county seats and not to all elections generally. Id. 97 P. at 341. Our first State Supreme Court, with all Justices concurring, cast aside this argument by pointing out that the election *191law applied with equal force to all counties, and was not a special or local law. Id. 97 P. at 358. In other words, the Legislature could enact different legislative schemes for different types of elections, and a legislative scheme for the particular election to select county seats was not a local or special law, because of its statewide application. This view that elections could be segregated according to the type of the election for purposes of statutory regulation is also seen in the way Title 26 is organized.5
In State ex rel. Short v. Callahan, 96 Okl. 276, 221 P. 718 (1923) the City Charter of Ponca City, unlike the general state election statutes, contained no provision for a partisan primary. In a challenge to the election of city officials our Court said this:
The nomination and election of municipal officers is a matter of purely municipal concern, which may be provided for by the charter of a self-governing city, adopted pursuant to section 329 (article 18, § 3a), Williams’ Constitution. Id.
The Court summed up its analysis as follows:
So in its last analysis the question for determination is whether the mandatory primary system for the nomination of elective officers is such a matter of grave state concern that it cannot be dispensed with and another method adopted by charter in nominating and electing the purely municipal officers of a self-governing city.
Id. 221 P. at 719. (Emphasis added).'
The Court went on to hold that the statewide election laws in controversy could not prevail over charter provisions to the contrary in the nomination and election of municipal officers.
In this case I discern no evidence showing such grave state concern as to require a three-day statutory contest period oyer a two-day charter-required period. I conclude that Art. Y § 46 is not offended by a two-day. protest period,6 and that to hold otherwise would generally invalidate statutes allowing a charter city to selectively apply state law to elections.
Does the Oklahoma City Charter provide for a protest period? The majority concludes that it does not. The provision is as follows:
Article X, Section 7 of the City Charter. Said certificate of election returns to be issued unless stayed by a timely filed application and notice of contest or challenge to correctness of the announced results, within two days next following said primary and general elections.
It states that a certificate of election returns is to be issued unless a timely protest is filed. If the section is read as counseled by respondents then the certificate could be issued upon expiration of the two day period, but before expiration of the statutory general three day protest period. In other words, the language staying the issuance of a certificate during the protest period would become meaningless if a protest were allowed after the issuance of the certificate. Judicial construction of legislative acts is based on a presumption that all of the legislative language is intended to have constitutional meaning and affect. TRW/Reda Pump v. Brewington, 829 P.2d 15, 20 (Okla.1992); Elias v. City of Tulsa, 408 P.2d 517, 521 (Okla.1965). In giving the provision its most logical and understandable interpretation, I read it to provide that a timely filed notice of contest is one that is filed within two days next following the election.7
*192Mr. Cornett’s reliance upon the Charter provision of Article X § 5 is misplaced. That provision states:
Section 5. General Election Laws Applicable. Except as in this Article X provided, in said primary election for the nomination of the Mayor and the Councilman and in the general election and canvass of returns and all other proceedings whatever relating to said elections, either primary or general, the general laws of this State applicable to municipal elections and primaries are hereby adopted and put into full force and effect with the further exception and proviso that on the primary and general election ballots no party emblem or party designation shall appear and the names of all nominees who are required to be on the ballot shall appear in one column. (Emphasis Added)
Even apart from the “[e]xcept as in Article X provided” language, this section has an important limitation on the application of state laws to the election process: “the general laws of this State applicable to municipal elections and primaries are hereby adopted.” This section does not state that the general laws are applicable, but rather that those applicable are adopted. What are the general laws applicable to municipal elections?
Title 11 O.S.1991 § 16-104 states that “The laws applicable to general elections shall govern general municipal elections except as otherwise provided.” The “otherwise provided” comes into play by § 16-102, which provides:
The provisions of Section 16-101 et seq. [including § 16-104] of this title shall not apply to any municipality which is governed by charter; provided, that in any election such a municipality may, by indicating in its resolution calling the election, choose to follow any provisions of state law governing elections conducted by a county election board when the municipality’s charter or ordinances are silent on the matter addressed by such provision.
11 O.S.1991 § 16-102(A). (Citation and emphasis added).
The City of Oklahoma City is a Charter City. Thus, those provisions of state law made applicable to municipal elections under Chapter 16 of Title 11 do not apply to the City of Oklahoma City.8
The statutory three-day period provided by 26 O.S.1991 § 8-109 and relied upon by the respondents does not contain any language making its provisions applicable to a municipal election, and it is located in Article VIII of Title 26 of the Oklahoma Statutes. Title 26 does contain an Article titled “Municipal Elections”, Article XIII of Title 26. But Article XIII does not expressly provide for election contests or require that the general election laws are made applicable to municipal elections. The latter omission is significant, because in Article XIII-A involving school district and vocational-technical school district elections, the legislature did provide that “Except as otherwise provided by law, the general election laws shall apply to all elections for school districts and vocational-technical school districts.” 26 O.S.Supp.1992 § 13A-101. Similar statutes are found in Article XII for specified special elections that do not include municipal elections. 26 O.S.1991 § 12-104, 12-109, 12-114, 12-117. Failure to expressly make the general election laws *193applicable to municipal elections certainly supports this finding of an intent not to do so.
A statutory requirement making all of the general election laws applicable to municipal elections is not needed, since Article XIII does state that the notice of a municipal election “shall contain the following facts: ... 6. For charter cities where the charter is silent, indication of any portion of state law, which will apply; ...” 26 O.S.1991 § 13-102(6). See also 11 O.S.1991 § 16-102(A), quoted above, and providing for application of state law via the resolution calling for the election.9 Because I conclude that the City Charter provides for the time to file election contests, § 13-102 does not apply, but it is important to an understanding of why the respondent’s reliance upon § 13-103 is not quite correct.
The respondents rely upon 26 O.S.1991 § 13-103. Part A of § 13-103 states that “All municipal elections shall be held at the same place and in the same manner prescribed for conduct of state and county elections unless otherwise provided by law.” Part C of § 13-103 states in part “Except as otherwise provided by law, the laws governing state and county Primary and General Elections shall be applicable to all municipal election.” Section 13-103 refers to partisan elections, location of precincts, the time the polling places will be open, and the composition of the precinct election board. It controls the manner the election is held, but does not deal with the procedure for bringing an election contest. If § 13-103 required the application of all general election laws to charter cities then § 13-102(6) would be an ineffectual redundancy and §, 13-109 a meaningless statutory appendage. Section 13-109 states:
Municipalities operating under a charter form of government shall be required to furnish a copy of said charter, as it applies to conduct of elections, to the county election board of the county wherein said municipality’s central offices are located. Any changes in a charter, as it applies to conduct of elections, shall be provided immediately to the appropriate county election board. (Emphasis added).
The Legislature thus understood that a provision of a city charter could control some aspect of conducting a municipal election, and that the appropriate County Election Board would be need to be informed of such. Thus I decline to adopt the respondent’s interpretation of § 13-103.
Our Constitution has given Oklahoma City the right to conduct its municipal affairs free from the control of the Legislature. Okla. Const. Art. 18 §§ 2, 3; State ex rel. Short v. Callahan, supra. Furthermore, the Legislature has not seen fit to place a law on our books, at this time, to expressly limit the period available for protest of a municipal election. There is no charter v. statute controversy; the statutes are silent on the subject. I would hold that the City Charter is the controlling law in this municipal election contest, and. that under Article X § 7 the time allowed to file a contest to an Oklahoma City Council election is within two days after the election. The contestant was a day late.
I am authorized to state that Chief Justice HODGES and Vice Chief Justice LAVENDER join in these views.

. With regard to characterizing a municipal election as a "core state function” I must note the following. A municipal election is required by statute to be paid for by municipal funds paid to the county election board. 26 O.S.1991 § 13-111. In State ex rel. Jordan v. City of Bethany, 769 P.2d 164 (Okla.1989) this Court ordered a District Court to enter judgment on behalf of three municipalities challenging a statutorily required "cost-sharing” imposed on the municipalities for the support of a state function. Id. 769 P.2d at 167. They challenged a statutory fee required to be paid to the Chief Medical Examiner for autopsies resulting from unexplained deaths occurring in the municipalities. This court reasoned that the cost-sharing imposed by the statute was unconstitutional because the Chief Medical Examiner performed a state service. My view is that a County Election Board is authorized to charge a municipality for conducting a municipal election, because the local election is not a state function, and serves a local municipal purpose and function. I decline to join an opinion that casts a legal shadow over the funding of municipal elections.

. The current version of Okla. Const. Art. Ill § 4 states:
The Legislature shall prescribe the time and manner of holding and conducting all elections, and enact such laws as may be necessary to detect and punish fraud in such elections. The Legislature may provide by law for the registration of electors throughout the state and, when it is so provided, no person shall vote at any election unless he shall have registered according to law.

. Okla. Const. Art. Ill § 5 states:
All elections shall be free and equal. No power, civil or military, shall ever interfere to prevent the free exercise of the right of suffrage, and electors shall, in all cases, except for treason, felony, and breach of the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance on elections and while going to and from the same.

. Construction of the Oklahoma Constitution is to be in accord with the intent of the framers and the people who adopted it. Draper v. State, 621 P.2d 1142, 1145 (Okla.1980). This intent is found in the instrument itself, and courts are not at liberty to search for the meaning of a provision beyond the instrument when text of the provision is unambiguous. Id. 621 P.2d at 1145-1146. See also McCurtain County Excise Bd. v. St. Louis-San Francisco Ry. Co., 340 P.2d 213, 216 (Okla.1959). Generally, when provisions have been adopted into the constitution that are similar to those of other states, it is presumed that the framers were conversant with, and intended to adopt the constructions of those provisions in other states. Wimberly v. Deacon, 195 Okl. 561, 144 P.2d 447, 450 (1943). For an example of this type of analysis see Baker v. Newton, 22 Okl. 658, 98 P. 931, 933 (1908). The Illinois court also determined that legislation was not a local or special law when it allowed cities to incorporate and thereby specify particular procedures for their local elections because the law applied to all cities in the state. Id. 5 N.E. at 599. This holding is consistent with my interpretation of 26 O.S.1991 § 13-102(6), discussed infra, as that statute allows a charter city to select a portion of state election law to apply by stating such in the resolution calling for the election.

.Title 26 of the Oklahoma Statutes is organized into Articles with some of these segregated according to the type of election, and these contain statutes for the particular type of election provided: Article I—State and County Elections—Political Parties, Article X—Presidential Electors, Article XI—Judicial Officers, Article XII—Special Elections, Article XIII—Municipal Elections, Article XIIIA—School District and Vocational-Technical School District Elections, Article XX—Presidential Preference Primary.

. Lackey v. State ex rel. Grant, supra; State ex rel. Short v. Callahan, supra; City of Pond Creek v. Haskell, supra; People ex rel. Grinnell v. Hoffman, supra; Patterson v. Barlow, supra.

. This construction of- the City Charter matches the statutory scheme for contests governed by the state statutes. The three-day statutory period for filing contests provided by § 8-109 harmonizes with the duty of an Election Board to not issue election certificates or lists in certain *192elections before the expiration of the time to contest those elections. 26 O.S.1991 §§ 8-106, 8-108. The comparable provision of § 8-106 for a municipal election is codified at 26 O.S. 1991 § 13-106. The time to certify the results for a municipal election is "[a]t the time prescribed by law”, and is not statutorily linked to a specific time corresponding to election contests. Id. Thus, just as the scheme for state elections prohibits the issuance of lists and certificates prior to the expiration of the contest period my interpretation of the City Charter is that it too intends a scheme of municipal elections where the issuance of lists and certificates will not be issued prior to the expiration of the contest period.

. I note that Chapter 16 of Title 11 also provides for municipal election contests and the filing of a petition alleging irregularities within a post-election three-day period. 11 O.S.1991 §§ 16-310, 16-312. Sections 16-310 and 16-312 are part of the Oklahoma Town Meeting Act, and that Act applies to municipalities of a specified population and that are not governed by charter. 11 O.S.1991 § 16-302.

. A statutory exception to the application of state law to elections in charter cities is not new. For an example see Okla.Sess.Laws 1910-1911, ch. 136, 316, 317, and its subsequent codification in a statute providing for the time of municipal elections. C.O.S.1921 § 4369.