On November 23, Virginia filed this response brief in Lux v Rodrigues, 10-1997.  This is the case over residency requirements for petition circulators.  Virginia’s brief tries to argue that the case is moot.  However, Virginia’s brief does not even mention the U.S. Supreme Court precedent that first established that ballot access cases are not moot just because the election is over.

That old U.S. Supreme Court precedent, Moore v Ogilvie, from 1969, said, “While the 1968 election is over, the burden allowed to be placed on the nomination of candidates for statewide office remains and controls future elections, as long as Illinois maintains her present system as she has done since 1935.”  Moore v Ogilvie did not say that the plaintiff-candidate needs to assert that he or she plans to run in future elections.  In Richardson v Ramirez, 418 US 24, at page 35, the U.S. Supreme Court commented that in Moore v Ogilvie, the plaintiff-candidate “was not apt to be revived in a future election.”  Yet Virginia’s new brief argues mightily that because Herb Lux, the candidate-plaintiff from the 2010 election, did not say he would run again in 2012, therefore the case is moot.