McAndrew, In re
| Citation | 524 A.2d 1072,105 Pa.Cmwlth. 503 |
| Parties | In re Nomination Petitions of Mary A. McANDREW. For the Republican and Democratic Nominations for District Justice of District 4 |
| Decision Date | 03 May 2003 |
| Court | Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania |
John A. Bednarz, Jr., Wilkes-Barre, for appellant.
James J. Powell, Scranton, for appellee.
Before CRAIG and DOYLE, JJ., and BARBIERI, Senior Judge.
In this election case, Robert Snyder, as an objector to a nominating petition, has appealed from an order of the Court of Common Pleas of Lackawanna County, acting as a board of elections, which authorized Mary McAndrew, a candidate for the office of district justice, to amend the candidate's affidavits and loyalty oaths on each of the four sheets of her nominating petition by adding her signatures, which she had failed to subscribe on all four forms.
The record developed at an evidentiary hearing in the trial court established, apparently to the satisfaction of that court, that an incumbent district justice had duly administered the respective oaths to the candidate and had properly executed the jurat appended to each form, confirming that the candidate had sworn to each of them.
As the objector points out, section 976 of the Election Code, 25 P.S. § 2936, requires that affidavits must accompany a nomination petition if it is to be acceptable for filing. That section in part states:
No nomination petition ... shall be permitted to be filed if (a) it contains material errors or defects apparent on the face thereof, or on the face of the appended or accompanying affidavits....
Section 977 of the Election Code, 25 P.S. § 2937, relating to nomination petition objections, confirms the essentiality of the affidavits as integral parts of nomination petitions by stating that, for the purposes of that section:
[A] nomination petition or paper shall include all affidavits required to be filed with such nomination petition or paper under this act.
The same section establishes the extent to which a court may allow amendments with respect to defects, by stating:
If the objections relate to material errors or defects apparent on the face of the nomination petition or paper, or on the face of the accompanying or appended affidavits, the court, after hearing, may, in its discretion, permit amendments within such time and upon such terms as to payment of costs, as the said court may specify.
The objector's brief acknowledges that defects apparent on the face of a nomination petition are amendable, including defects in an affidavit, but the objector takes the position that the unsubscribed affidavits do not merely constitute affidavits with defects, but are nullities and therefore do not constitute affidavits at all in a legal sense.
Therefore, the question here presented is: Where a candidate has duly sworn to the content of the candidate's affidavits and oaths within her nomination petition, but has failed to subscribe her signature to them, must the courts regard the nomination petition sheets as devoid of the required affidavits, or as amendable for the purpose of remedying the absence of...
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