Seergy v. Kings County Republican County Committee

• Decision Date: 20 April 1972
• Docket Number: No. 733-735,72-1313 and 72-1315.,Dockets 72-1289,733-735
• Citation: 459 F.2d 308
• Parties: Edmund G. SEERGY et al., Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. KINGS COUNTY REPUBLICAN COUNTY COMMITTEE et al., Defendants-Appellants, and Louis J. Lefkowitz, Attorney General of the State of New York, Intervenor-Appellant, and Charles H. Lanigan, Chairman of the Republican State Committee, Intervenor-Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit

459 F.2d 308 (1972)

Edmund G. SEERGY et al., Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. KINGS COUNTY REPUBLICAN COUNTY COMMITTEE et al., Defendants-Appellants, and Louis J. Lefkowitz, Attorney General of the State of New York, Intervenor-Appellant, and Charles H. Lanigan, Chairman of the Republican State Committee, Intervenor-Appellant.

Nos. 733-735, Dockets 72-1289, 72-1313 and 72-1315.

United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit.

Argued March 24, 1972.

Decided April 20, 1972.

Harold L. Fisher, Brooklyn, N. Y. (Albert J. Millus, New York City, on the brief), for defendants-appellants Kings County Republican County Committee, John R. Crews, Anthony N. Durso, Peter Deutsch and Executive Committee of the Kings County Republican County Committee.

Daniel M. Cohen, Asst. Atty. Gen. (Louis J. Lefkowitz, Atty. Gen. of New York, Samuel A. Hirshowitz, First Asst. Atty. Gen., New York City, on the brief), for intervenor-appellant pursuant to Executive Law, McKinney's Consol.Laws, c. 18, § 71.

Arthur H. Schwartz, New York City (Charles G. Moerdler, New York City, on the brief), for intervenor-appellant Charles H. Lanigan as Chairman of the New York Republican State Committee.

Walter C. Reid, New York City (Raymond McKaba and Salvatore D'Ambrosio, New York City, on the brief), for plaintiffs-appellees.

Before HAYS, MANSFIELD and MULLIGAN, Circuit Judges.

MANSFIELD, Circuit Judge:

We are called upon once again to delve into the intricacies of the New York Election Law, this time to determine whether a procedure authorized by it for the election and voting powers of members of a county political committee operate to deprive duly registered voters of their constitutional right to equal protection of the laws.

The plaintiffs below, enrolled Republican voters and members of the Kings County Republican County Committee, brought this action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983¹ to challenge the system by which committeemen's votes in the Kings County Republican County Committee are counted. Specifically plaintiffs contend that a rule adopted by that Committee pursuant to § 12 of the Election Law, McKinney's Consol.Laws, c. 17, which gives each county committee member an equal vote rather than a vote weighted according to the number of Republican voters in the district he represents, violates the "one-man, one-vote" principle established by the Supreme Court as a voter's constitutional right in the election of government officials. Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186, 82 S.Ct. 691, 7 L.Ed. 663 (1962); Gray v. Sanders, 372 U.S. 368, 83 S.Ct. 801, 9 L.Ed. 2d 821 (1963); Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U.S. 533, 84 S.Ct. 1362, 12 L.Ed.2d 506 (1964); Avery v. Midland County, 390 U.S. 474, 88 S.Ct. 1114, 20 L.Ed.2d 45 (1968). Upon the undisputed facts Judge Dooling denied defendants' motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint and granted plaintiffs' similar motion to the extent of declaring invalid the aforementioned Committee rule and the language of § 12 which authorized its adoption. We affirm in part and reverse in part.

A full understanding of the plaintiffs' constitutional claims requires some discussion of the function of party county committees and of the pertinent sections of the New York Election Law. The political subdivisions of the State of New York consist of counties, each of which is subdivided into assembly districts. Each assembly district, in turn, is divided into election districts. The election district is the basic unit of representation within the state's electoral system. Each of the major political parties gears itself to this structure, conducting primary elections in which candidates for party nomination are designated by means of petitions signed by a relatively small number of enrolled voters of the party. The enrolled members of the party then select candidates for the general election by casting primary ballots, with each voter's ballot having equal voting strength.

Each political party conducts its business in the State of New York through committees. The New York Republican Party, for instance, acts through a state committee and county committees. Each county committee is elected by enrolled members of the Republican Party within that county. Except in rare instances the county committee does not perform any electoral functions on behalf of its enrolled party members. Its function is essentially to handle the party's internal affairs at the county level, including the promotion of Republican candidates and policies for consideration by its members, development of party programs, solicitation of uncommitted voters to enroll in the Republican Party, raising of campaign funds, manning of the polls at election time, distribution of party literature, canvassing voters, electioneering, and similar activities.

In rare instances, the county committee may choose the party nominee or play a major part in that determination. The committee, for instance, may nominate a candidate to fill a vacancy in an elective office (except for statewide offices) which occurs after the fifth Tuesday preceding the fall primary by majority vote of a quorum. Election Law § 131(7). It may nominate Republican Party candidates for other than statewide offices to be filled at a special election, Election Law § 131(6); Rules of the Kings County Republican County Committee, Art. IV, § 1(a), and may fill vacancies in nominations made at a fall primary unless the party rules provide otherwise. Election Law § 140(3). The county committee must also consent before the party nomination for other than statewide office may be given to a person not enrolled in the party. Election Law § 137(4). Most often, however, these duties fall to the Executive Committee, which in Kings County, "at all times when the County Committee is not in actual session, shall have, possess and exercise all the rights, privileges, powers and duties which the County Committee may have and possess, except where such rights, privileges, powers and duties are by statute vested in or imposed upon said County Committee exclusively," Rules of the Kings County Republican County Committee, Art. IV, § 1(e).

Under state law each political party by appropriate rule determines for itself which committees other than state and county committees shall be formed and in what manner such committees shall be organized. Election Law § 14. The Election Law, however, prescribes the way in which state and county committees are to be established. Section 12² provides that the county committee shall consist of two members elected from each election district within the county, and that the voting power of each member thus elected "shall be in proportion to such party vote" in his election district. The same section, however, also allows each county committee to choose an alternative election procedure whereby up to two additional members (up to four members in all) may be elected from each election district. In counties where this option to elect additional committee members is exercised, the Election Law requires that "each member of the county committee shall have one vote."

The defendant Kings County Republican County Committee, by Art. 1, § 1 of its Rules,³ has chosen the second of the foregoing alternatives authorized by § 12 of the Election Law. As a result each county committeeman has an equal vote instead of the weighted vote (based on the number of Republican constituents in his election district) which he would have if the county committee had chosen the first alternative and limited each election district to two committeemen. Because of the wide disparities in Republican voter strength among the various Kings County election districts, committeemen from districts with low Republican enrollment exercise a voting strength much greater than the proportionate strength of the Republican voters they represent.

It is this failure to accord voting weight in proportion to the voting strength of each committeeman's constituency that is attacked by plaintiffs as violative of the "one-man, one-vote" principle.⁴ Plaintiffs contend that in all county committee matters they are entitled in effect to the equivalent of "one Republican, one vote." Judge Dooling agreed, finding that "no reason appears which can justify the arbitrary voting weight result that is produced in the Kings County Republican County Committee by reason of the rule provision for additional members and the consequent shearing away of the weighted voting requirement," and holding that Art. 1, § 1 of the Rules of the Kings County Republican County Committee and that portion of § 12 of the Election Law relied on in the promulgation of that rule are invalid and cannot be given effect.

Before proceeding to the merits we must first consider the state's contention that since § 12 of the Election Law is statewide in its application Judge Dooling's declaration of unconstitutionality as applied could properly have been made only by a three-judge court pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2281, from which an appeal would lie directly to the Supreme Court rather than to ourselves. See Query v. United States, 316 U.S. 486, 490, 62 S.Ct. 1122, 86 L.Ed. 1616 (1942). Convocation of a three-judge court pursuant to § 2281, however, is required only where an "injunction restraining the enforcement, operation or execution of any State statute by restraining the action of any officer of such State in the enforcement or execution of such statute" is sought. Although the complaint here requested injunctive relief in addition to declaratory relief, the plaintiffs appear to have abandoned their prayer for an injunction before any proceedings had been begun, and thereafter to have sought only a declaratory judgment,⁵ which would not require the convening of a three-judge court, Mitchell v. Donovan, 398 U.S. 427, 430-431, 90 S.Ct. 1763, 26 L.Ed.2d 378 (1970); Kennedy v. Mendoza-Martinez, 372 U.S. 144, 154-155, 83 S.Ct. 554, 9 L.Ed.2d 644 (1963), even though the complaint as...