U.S. District Court Declines to Stop Georgia from Adjudicating Whether Congresswoman Marjorie Greene Taylor Meets the Qualifications

On April 18, U.S. District Court Judge Amy Totenberg refused to enjoin the state of Georgia from adjudicating whether Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene meets the Qualifications to be in Congress. Greene v Raffensperger, n.d., 1:22cv-1294. The Congresswoman is being challenged on the basis that she violated section three of the 14th amendment. Here is the 73-page opinion.

The opinion says Greene does have standing. It also says the federal court does have the authority to hear her case (the state had argued that the federal court must abstain).

But the decision says that the burden on Greene, by having to be subjected to a state administrative challenge, is not severe. It says there is no reason to expect that the process won’t be fair. The opinion also says that states do have a role in adjudicating qualifications.

The decision notes that recently, a U.S. District Court in North Carolina had ruled (in a similar case involving Congressman Madison Cawthorn) that when congress passed an amnesty bill in 1872, that also covered all future cases. The Georgia decision says that the North Carolina court ruling is mistaken. The North Carolina case is currently being appealed in the Fourth Circuit.

Greene’s name will be on the Georgia primary ballot, but if the state’s challenge process determines that she is not eligible, the voters for her won’t be counted.


Comments

U.S. District Court Declines to Stop Georgia from Adjudicating Whether Congresswoman Marjorie Greene Taylor Meets the Qualifications — 10 Comments

  1. POSSIBLE 14-2 AMDT VIOLATION IF VOTES NOT COUNTED.

    TOO MANY PARTY HACK MORON JUDGES TO COUNT.

  2. Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment prohibits certain individuals and office holders, who had previously taken an oath of office to support the Constitution of the United States, from holding federal or state office if they “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the United States as follows:
    No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or
    elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or
    military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having
    previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.
    U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 3.
    The Congress, and only the Congress, can impose this disability on an person who has been elected or remove it. The States have NO role in administering this provision for federal offices. The amendment says that a person shall not hold federal or state office if having engaged in insurrection or rebellion. It does not say a person is disqualified from being a candidate or from being elected by the voters to federal or state offices.
    The Amendment does not require Congress to act on each person individually. It creates a class of individuals and the congress may remove the disability-disqualification in mass for that class and ALL their descendants.
    To enforce the prohibition in the future the Congress must define and create a new class of persons disqualified from HOLDING office.
    In any event, this clause of the 14th Amendment does not extend to the ballot or impair the right of voters to choose who they want to serve in office.

  3. Need I remind you, readers, that when the 14th Amendment was ratified there were no state monopolies of the ballot. ALL ballots were private property and this Amendment could not possibly have been contemplated to apply ballots and elections.

  4. Notice the trend in the last couple of years. Slightly more emphasize on keeping people off the ballot than getting them on. That’s a bad trend.

  5. @DFR,

    Prior to institution of the Australian ballot in Texas, the authority certifying the result would make a determination as to whether the apparent winner was eligible. If not, they could not certify that candidate.

    After the Australian ballot was instituted an eligibility check was added before the ballots were printed. This presumably avoids a void election and a special election to fill a vacancy.

  6. @RW,

    The opinion cited two cases where a presidential candidate was kept off the ballot because they were not qualified.

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