Court Opinion

ID: 9783400
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 19:45:14.29869+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:35:23.168657
License: Public Domain

BONIN, J.,
concurs with reasons.
I respectfully concur.
|xOur decision today makes no judgment on whether the challenged candidate, Ms. Juneau, possesses the constitutionally-determined qualifications for the office which she seeks. See La. Const, art. V, § 24(A)(1). We only decide that the cause of action which the objecting citizens, Ms. Scaglione and Mr. Doran, once had was destroyed by the passage of time when they failed to name the Secretary of State as a party defendant by 4:30 P.M. on July 16, 2010. See La. R.S. 18:1402 A(2), 1405, 452(1) and 462 A. As the objecting citizens acknowledge, the Lawmaker designed expedited court proceedings for challenging a candidate’s qualifications and set forth a simple and clear directive that the Secretary of State must be sued as a defendant by the deadline. The Lawmaker’s policy selection to foreclose protracted legal proceedings during a campaign for public office (which distract both the voters and the candidates) is, in my view, a sound selection, the effect of which is-in this case-to refer for the time being the issue of Ms. Juneau’s ^qualifications to the voters of St. Bernard Parish or, as it is sometimes expressed, to the court of public opinion.