Court Opinion

ID: 9674531
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 04:30:16.423274+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:27.978003
License: Public Domain

Steele Hays, Justice, dissenting. While I agree with the dissenting opinions I feel the need to add my own views to the several being expressed. I read the opinion of Justice Lyle Brown in Henderson v. Anderson, 251 Ark. 724, 475 S.W.2d 508 (1972) as precedent for this case. In Henderson this court held that the circuit court had jurisdiction to try wet-dry elections. Why? Because under the provisions of Act 456 of 1969 a contest of local option elections was removed from county court and placed in circuit court. There were no dissents to that holding and it binds us now, or should. Wurst v. Lowry, 286 Ark. 474, 695 S.W.2d 378 (1985) is not precedent for this case. In Wurst we held that an attempt in April 1984 to intervene in a local option election contest held in November, 1980 was “far too late.” We simply drew an analogy to the time allowed for contesting local option elections, which we mistakenly said was ten days, rather than twenty days. That was plainly dictum, the holding of the case being that a belated intervention years after the election was 1) too late and 2) without merit. That decision in no sense governs the case at hand. I respectfully dissent from the denial of rehearing.