On March 26, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court issued an opinion in Reuther v Delaware County Bureau of Elections, 6 MAP 2018. The Court agreed with the lower court that candidates nominated by write-in vote in primaries are not required to file a Statement of Financial Interests.
This is not a decision on constitutionality. It is an opinion that interprets the Pennsylvania election law, which literally only requires the Statement to be filed by candidates who submit a petition to be on the ballot. Because no Pennsylvania law requires any write-in candidates (in either the primary or general election) to file a petition, the candidate could not be kept off the general election ballot. The plaintiff, Christine Reuther, had won the Republican primary on write-in votes, on May 16, 2017, for the office of Tax Collector of a township.
The Supreme Court wrote, “This Court must honor the unambiguous statutory directive, which applies the fatal defect rule only to those who petition to appear on the ballot, not to write-in candidates. Exclusion of a candidate chosen by a party’s electors is an extreme judicial intervention in the democratic process that should be imposed only when required by unambiguous legislative mandate. Because elections ‘constitute the very warp and woof of democracy’, election laws must be liberally construed to protect a candidate’s right to run for office and the voters’ right to elect a candidate of their choice.”
