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Ellen Belcher is the Dayton Daily News opinion pages editor. She writes about state government, education, the environment, higher education and all things Dayton.
Martin Gottlieb is an editorial writer and columnist for the Dayton Daily News opinion pages. He focuses on the political process itself and does such national issues as war, the economy, taxes and Social Security, as well as a hodge-podge of local and state issues.Home > Blogs > A Matter of Opinion > Archives > 2009 > August > 16 > Entry
Martin Gottlieb: Husted, Brunner find agreement: Call in top court
As has been noted here before, the case of Jon Husted and whether he actually lives in Kettering or Columbus has certain fun elements to it.
One is that the matter has been in the hands of Democratic Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner even as Republican Husted has been planning a race for that job.
The case arose at a time when Brunner was putting together a run for the U.S. Senate; but many Democrats have been hoping she will, instead, run for re-election.
She could theoretically rule that Husted is not a qualified voter in Kettering, upholding the view of the Democrats on the county elections board.
However, she could not remove him from the Senate. That would be up to the Senate, which wouldn’t do it.
A candidate (meaning Husted) for the office that applies the laws about who can vote wouldn’t relish a finding that he’s not eligible to vote where he votes.
As to that, though, if such a finding were reached entirely by Democrats, it would carry about as much moral weight as the impeachment of Bill Clinton by the then-Republican U.S. House.
So Brunner seemed to be squirming as much as Husted. She does not want to be seen as a flaming partisan.
She took her time about coming to a decision. When the local elections board deadlocked 2-2 along party lines, the buck was passed to her. She said she didn’t have enough information. She sought some from Husted and ultimately sent the case back here.
Now Husted has filed a suit with the (all-Republican) Ohio Supreme Court, saying she had no right to seek more information or send the case back.
He says she was obligated to make a decision fast. On that ground and more, he wants the court to take control of the matter and preferably resolve it his favor.
Husted’s timing adds another little element of amusement here.
When Brunner came through Dayton a few weeks ago, she said she expected to have a decision right about now. She said the local board had a couple of weeks to send its second finding to her. (It deadlocked again, shocking everybody — with the exception of everybody.) She expected to act a couple of weeks later.
In fact, when Husted filed his suit, Brunner says, she was about to review a staff draft and hopefully make a decision that very night. The filing aborted that process. Now Brunner has three weeks to respond to the suit.
She says having the court resolve the case has much to be said for it. For one thing, she expected it to end up there anyway if she ruled against Husted.
Moreover, she says, there are three conflicting statutes about residency and how to determine it. She says there’s no case history as to which trumps which. So the court should decide.
Nobody is looking great here. An ordinary voter-residency case is supposed to be resolved in about 10 days. Blame for the delay can be spread around. Husted is seeing political motives in stringing him along. Brunner says Husted was slow about providing requested information. And, yes, the laws are less than crystal clear.
At this stage, there certainly is something to be said for getting the thing resolved fast. It’s been hanging around roughly all year.
Some might consider the whole issue frivolous. Husted was speaker of the House for four years, a full-time job. He married a woman in the Columbus area and has two children there. Obviously, he wasn’t going to be spending much time in Kettering.
Still, the state — through the county — did have to do an investigation after issues arose about which residence is his primary one, which affects what he pays in property taxes; about whether he ever spent significant time in Kettering; and about whether he plans to return to Montgomery County (which is one consideration in determining residency).
If the public has the impression that everybody so far seems to be acting as a member of his or her political party, the reason is that the law is murky enough to allow that.
Permalink | Comments (1) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns, Martin Gottlieb, Miami Valley Politics, Ohio politics
Comments
By howrad
August 20, 2009 2:09 PM | Link to this
Brunner was sure a flaming partisan last year ignoring the voter fraud complaints, why worry about it now?