New Lenox, Illinois, has an elected School Board of seven members. Each member is elected in non-partisan elections to a four-year term. This year four full-length seats are up. Also there is a special election for a two-year term to fill a vacancy. The only ballot-listed candidate for the short term is Kathleen Miller. The election is April 9, 2013.

Earlier this year, another board member, Maureen Broderick, who is not up for re-election this year, challenged Miller’s petition. The basis for the challenge was a technicality. Miller had circulated her own petition, and she accidentally signed off in the line reserved for the Notary, instead of the line for the circulator. Broderick challenged the petition, but then she withdrew her challenge and then a third individual filed the same type of challenge. Broderick, as the Secretary of the Board, was then in a position to vote on whether Miller should be removed from the ballot. The Board members did then remove Miller from the ballot, but Miller sued and a state court judge ruled that she should be on the ballot.

On March 27, Miller sued Broderick in U.S. District Court. The Complaint points out that Broderick was acting in her capacity as an officer of the local school board when she voted to remove Miller from the ballot, so in a sense the lawsuit is against an action taken by a government. The complaint says that it violates due process for someone to file a challenge to someone else’s petition, and then vote on that same challenge. The case is Miller v Broderick, northern district, 1:13cv-2281.