The Sixth Circuit will hear George v Hargett, 16-5563, on August 2. The issue is the meaning of this part of the Tennessee Constitution concerning popular votes cast for state constitutional amendments: “If the people shall approve such amendment by a majority of all the citizens of the state voting for Governor, voting in their favor, such amendment shall become a part of that Constitution.”

This had always been interpreted to mean that if the amendment receives a number of votes greater than 50% of the vote cast for Governor, then it passes. However, in 2016, U.S. District Court Judge Kevin Sharp ruled that it really means that the individual voters who left their ballot blank for Governor cannot then vote on the constitutional amendment. If Judge Sharp is correct, that would mean when the ballots are counted, any votes cast by voters on the amendment don’t count if that voter left Governor blank.

The case arose in 2014, when a state constitutional amendment was on the ballot restricting abortion. It received 729,163 “yes” votes, and 657,192 “no” votes. But opponents of the amendment filed a federal lawsuit, saying the measure failed because election authorities didn’t disqualify the votes of people who left Governor blank. Obviously that can’t be done now. Some of the 2014 ballots don’t even exist any longer, so no one can look at each one. The gubernatorial vote in 2014 was 1,353,728; 50% of that number is 676,864. The government believed that the amendment passed because the “yes” vote was greater than 50% of the gubernatorial vote.

The Sixth Circuit panel consists of Judge Richard Suhrheinrich (a Bush Sr. appointee), Ronald Gilman (a Clinton appointee), and David McKeague (a Bush Jr. appointee).

The Guam legislative committee that handles election law bills will hear Bill 45 on August 7. The bill abolishes partisan primaries, to save taxpayers $400,000 per election year. It also converts the legislature from a full-time legislature to a part-time legislature. The bill is backed by Guam Citizens for Public Accountability, which has this commentary on the bill.

This article in the Washington Post’s The Fix explains new political science research by Andrew Hall and Daniel Thompson, of Stanford. Their research shows that when one of the major parties nominates an extremist for U.S. House, that nominee is more likely to lose the general election. This is partly because the extremist candidate’s existence causes increased voter turnout among the supporters of the other major party.