Court Opinion

ID: 9719838
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 08:06:28.06256+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:10.544652
License: Public Domain

MR. JUSTICE UNDERWOOD, concurring in part and dissenting in part: While I concur with the court’s conclusion that the method of nominating members of the State Board of Elections is constitutionally impermissible, I do not agree that the “tie-breaker” procedure violates the due process guarantees of either the Federal or State constitutions. The court cites no authority for its holding that permitting the clerk of the Board to select by lot the name of one Board member who shall then be disqualified to vote on the deadlocked proposition, leaving it to be resolved by the remaining members, is a denial of due process to those on the losing side of the proposition. This is said to be so because resolution of the deadlocked question is arrived at in an “arbitrary manner,” without “reasoned deliberation,” and that “the rights of individual parties” are affected thereby. Certainly this is true. But it is by no means unique. Our own constitution provides a similar method for resolving questions of decennial legislative reapportionment when neither the General Assembly nor the subsequently appointed Legislative Redistricting Commission can reach agreement. In that event this court “shall submit the names of two persons, not of the same political party, to the Secretary of State,” who thereafter “publicly shall draw by random selection the name of one of the two persons to serve as the ninth member of the Commission.” (Ill. Const. 1970, art. IV, sec. 3(b).) That provision, which is, in my judgment, indistinguishable from the provision for resolving Board of Election deadlocks, was upheld in People ex rel. Scott v. Grivetti (1971), 50 Ill. 2d 156, against constitutional challenges on equal protection and first amendment grounds. The rights of individuals are also affected every time an individual’s right to public office is decided by lot (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1975, ch. 46, par. 23—27) and when the identity of persons selected for military service is determined by a lottery, to mention only a few illustrative examples. I am aware of no case, and the majority cites none, which has held these lottery methods of resolving those problems to involve a denial of due process even though their use results in most unhappy consequences for the “losers.” Our system of government tolerates these lotteries as a means of resolving important questions because they are believed to be fairest to the interested individuals or groups involved or those who have been unable to agree. For those candidates who receive the same number of votes for a public office there may be no other practical means of breaking the tie other than by tossing a coin or drawing a name from a hat. It is suggested here that appointment of a fifth member, an “independent,” to the Board would be a viable means of avoiding deadlocks. Assuming that individuals of reasonable intelligence exist who are truly “independent,” who have been so unconcerned with the qualifications of their public officials and the functioning of their government as to have never voted in a primary election or supported one or the other of the major political parties, the General Assembly might well have thought the public interest best served by leaving to chance the resolution of deadlocked issues rather than to the vote of so politically sterile an individual. Nor do I agree that random disqualification of a Board member on a deadlocked issue unbalances the political representation of the Board members in the sense that such imbalance is proscribed by the provision in article III, section 5, that “[n] o political party shall have a majority of members of the Board.” The temporary disqualification of a Board member on a particular question does not remove him from the Board. I note also that the statute contemplates the occurrence of vacancies (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1975, ch. 46, par. 1A—14), and certainly neither the constitutional drafters nor the General Assembly envisioned that the Board would cease functioning in the event of illness or death of a member (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1975, ch. 46, par. 1A—7). If the validity of the “tie-breaker” provision is to be considered at all, I would hold it valid.