Court Opinion

ID: 9602373
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 01:53:53.355319+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:02:02.060362
License: Public Domain

DISSENTING OPINION OF
RICHARDSON, C J.
I respectfully dissent.
While I generally concur with the majority opinion’s statements of law and facts, I disagree with the conclusion reached by the application of the law to the facts.
FACTS
The appellant instituted this action to test the constitutionality of HRS § 12-41. She contends that it denied her equal protection of the laws and unduly burdened her right of association and the voters’ right to vote by discriminating against her because she is a nonpartisan as opposed to a partisan candidate. The defendants were granted summary judgment.
HRS § 12-41 requires partisan candidates to win their primary election while nonpartisan candidates must win their *299primary election and either receive a vote equal to a winning partisan candidate or equal to 10 percent of the votes cast in the primary election to appear on the general election ballot.
The appellant was a candidate for mayor of Maui. There were 30,355 registered voters, of which 19,022 were registered as democrat, 2,516 as republican, 105 as nonpartisan and 8,477 were undesignated. Only nonpartisans and undesignated voters could vote for the appellant. HRS § 12-31.
The trial record does not reflect how many voters participated in the primary election or the number of votes the appellant needed to satisfy HRS § 12-41. The trial record also does not reflect that the 1978 democratic gubernatorial race was highly contested and probably caused many of the undesignated voters to choose a democratic ballot.
ISSUE
Whether the trial court erred in granting summary judgment where the trial record is deplete of facts necessary to determine whether HRS § 12-41 unduly burdened the appellant’s right of association and the voters’ right to vote.
DISCUSSION
Williams v. Rhodes, 393 U.S. 23 (1968) protected the First Amendment “rights of individuals to associate for the advancement of their political beliefs, and the right of qualified voters, regardless of political persuasion, to cast their votes effectively’ ’ by subjecting ballot access requirements to strict scrutiny. Id. at 30.
Storer v. Brown, 415 U.S. 724 (1974) and American Party v. White, 415 U.S. 767 (1974) ignored the traditional strict scrutiny test — where imposition of the test automatically invalidates the subject statute and the state is effectively prevented from showing a compelling state interest — and considered the state’s interest in conducting effective elections. In pursuit of this objective the state may require candidates to demonstrate substantial public support but the requirements cannot be too restrictive. The test is whether the *300candidate can appear on the general election ballot by exercising reasonable diligence. In applying the test the facts in the particular case must be considered.
In American Party v. White, supra, the challenged statute required a political party to secure two percent of the vote in the. previous general election or file petitions signed by registered voters numbering at least one percent of the votes cast in that prior election. The statute was upheld because a reasonably diligent party could meet the requirements of the statute. This was supported by evidence that two of the plaintiffs had previously satisfied the statute and appeared on the ballot.
In Storer v. Brown, supra, the challenged statute imposed a five percent petition requirement for independent candidates and restricted the pool of eligible signers to those who had not participated in another party’s primary election. The record was inadequate to decide the case. Thus, it was remanded with instructions to determine whether a reasonably diligent candidate could satisfy the statute.
In the instant case, the majority opinion states that the appellant could have satisfied HRS § 12-41 by exercising reasonable diligence because she only needed 2,760 votes from a pool of 8,582 voters (105 nonpartisans and 8,477 undesignated voters). The opinion admits: “We do not consider that it was impractical for the appellant... to obtain the votes of up to 2,760 of these registered voters.” Yet, the opinion’s statement of the law states that the reasonable diligence test must be applied with a view to the “facts in the particular case.” Indeed, American Party v. White, supra, states: “The Constitution requires that access to the electorate be real, not ‘merely theoretical.’ ” Id. at 783. Despite this established rule, the opinion concludes that remanding the case for further factual inquiry, as ordered in Storer v. Brown, supra, is not necessary.
The instant case was. decided by summary judgment. Where there are disputed issues of material fact, summary judgment will be denied. E.g., Creative Leisure International, Inc. v. Aki, 59 Haw. 272, 580 P.2d 66 (1978). We do not know how many votes the appellant needed to satisfy the *301requirements of HRS § 12-41 or how many of the undesignated voters were likely not to choose a nonpartisan ballot because of the democratic gubernatorial election. These facts are necessary to determine whether the appellant could satisfy HRS § 12-41 by exercising reasonable diligence. Therefore, the summary judgment should have been denied and the case remanded to decide these issues of fact.