Kurita Answers Motions Filed By Defendants In District Court Case
Posted on October 10, 2008 at 8:08 amSenator Rosalind Kurita’s attorneys answered yesterday various motions by defendants Tim Barnes, the Tennessee Democratic Party, and several state officials urging the United States District Court for Middle Tennessee to dismiss or abstain from judgment in the Fourteenth Amendment case brought to it by Kurita.
Senator Kurita, the certified victor in the 22nd District State Senate Democratic Primary, on Sept. 13th saw her election declared “incurably uncertain” by the Tennessee Democratic Party Executive Committee acting as the State Primary board.
A tri-county convention of executive committee members in the three counties of her district then voted 61-4 to install her opponent, Tim Barnes, as the Democratic nominee. Kurita is currently running as a write-in candidate.
Most political observers believe that the moves against Kurita by Democratic Party officials was payback for her 2007 vote for Republican Speaker of the Senate Ron Ramsey.
Kurita has charged the party with violating her Fourteenth Amendment rights in removing her name from the ballot as the Democratic nominee for the 22nd State Senate District.
At issue in the case is T.C.A. § 2-17-104 which designates a political party’s executive committee as the “decider” in the case of a contested primary election.
Barnes and other defendants contend that this law was properly applied in the contested election and that the court has no reason to intervene in the matter.
Senator Kurita, in filings by her attorney James Bopp, contends that “T.C.A. § 2-17-104 does not contain any standards or procedures that must be followed by a state primary board in resolving a primary election dispute.”
Kurita’s lawyers make the case that it is thus irrelevant whether due process is afforded in a particular case or not. They argue that T.C.A. § 2-17-104 is unconstitutional because it “empowers the state primary boards to adjudicate protected rights without due process of law.” In making this argument, however, they do not concede that due process was followed in this case.
Kurita’s lawyers’ full answer to the motions filed by Barnes et al is linked here. Defendants’ motions are available below.
A trial on the merits remains scheduled for October 10, 2008, at 10:00 a.m. Today.
SEE ALSO:
TNDP’s motion to dismiss or abstain
Tim Barnes motion to dismiss
State defendants motion to dismiss or abstain
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