United States v. State
| Decision Date | 12 February 2015 |
| Docket Number | No. 14–11298.,14–11298. |
| Citation | 778 F.3d 926 |
| Parties | UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff–Appellee, v. State of ALABAMA, Secretary, State of Alabama, Defendants–Appellants. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Preempted
Ala.Code 1975, § 17–13–18Jodi Danis, Anna Baldwin, Richard Dellheim, Spencer Ross Fisher, Mark L. Gross, Thomas Christian Herren, Jr., Amanda Hine, Ernest Alan McFarland, Elizabeth M. Ryan, Erin M. Velandy, Victor J. Williamson, U.S. Department of Justice, Washington, DC, George L. Beck, Jr., Stephen Michael Doyle, U.S. Attorney's Office, Montgomery, AL, for Plaintiff–Appellee.
Andrew Lynn Brasher, James W. Davis, Misty Shawn Fairbanks Messick, Luther J. Strange, III, Laura E. Howell, Alabama Attorney General's Office, Montgomery, AL, for Defendants–Appellants.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle District of Alabama. D.C. Docket No. 2:12–cv–00179–MHT–WC.
Before MARCUS, JILL PRYOR and EBEL,* Circuit Judges.
In our nation's recent history, active military personnel and their families have faced severe difficulties exercising their fundamental right to vote. For affected service members, the decision to serve their country was the very act that frequently deprived them of a voice in selecting its government. Congress responded to this real problem by passing the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act (“UOCAVA”), a comprehensive series of requirements aimed at ending the widespread disenfranchisement of military voters stationed overseas. The statute includes a variety of measures that the states are required to adopt in order to accommodate military voters when they administer federal elections. By passing UOCAVA, and later by strengthening its protections, Congress unequivocally committed to eliminating procedural roadblocks, which historically prevented thousands of service members from sharing in the most basic of democratic rights.
Today, we are called upon to interpret a single provision in UOCAVA's general scheme. The parties in this case disagree about the meaning and scope of Title 52 U.S.C. § 20302(a)(8)(A)'s requirement that, when a qualifying military or overseas voter requests an absentee ballot for a federal election, a state must transmit a ballot to that voter forty-five days before the federal election. Neither this Court, nor any of our sister circuits, have opined on the scope of Congress's instruction. The United States commenced this suit against Alabama in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Alabama, seeking to enjoin the State from holding federal runoff elections forty-two days after federal primary elections. The United States argued that the Alabama schedule violated UOCAVA's mandate and threatened to deprive military voters of the time they needed to receive and return their absentee ballots during runoff elections. The district court agreed, and after thorough review, we affirm.
The obligation that Congress has placed on the states is unambiguous: they must transmit absentee ballots to service members who validly request them forty-five days before “an election for Federal office.” § 20302(a)(8)(A). Various other elements of § 20302(a)(8)(A) and of the surrounding sections of the statute confirm our understanding. As we explain in detail, Congress knew how to limit the scope of a provision so that it applied only during certain elections. Similarly, it knew how to create explicit exceptions to general rules, and indeed created an undue hardship exception to the forty-five day transmission timeline. § 20302(a)(8)(A), (g). But by choosing not to use these tools, which it otherwise wielded when drafting this statute, Congress gave us a clear indication that each state must comply with the forty-five day transmission requirement for any federal election, including a runoff election, for which it has not met the elements of undue hardship.
Alabama largely accepts these observations, but it urges us to hold that another UOCAVA provision, § 20302(a)(9), sets up an alternative rule for federal runoff elections. The State submits that § 20302(a)(9) directs the states to “establish a written plan that provides absentee ballots are made available to absent uniformedservices voters and overseas voters in [a] manner that gives them sufficient time to vote in the runoff election.” Id. (emphasis added). It urges us to read this language as allowing each state to determine how much time would be “sufficient” for its UOCAVA voters to return their ballots during runoff elections. We cannot agree. When we look to the text of § 20302(a)(9), we find that it directs states only to “ establish a written plan” in preparation for runoff elections, and makes no claim that it abrogates the mandatory forty-five day transmission timeline. Id. (emphasis added). In light of the plain language of this substantive command—and Congress's clear intent to prioritize the empowerment of military voters through clear and accessible absentee voting procedures—we conclude that § 20302(a)(9) does not alter our interpretation. We, therefore, hold that the State must transmit validly requested absentee ballots to eligible UOCAVA voters forty-five days before each federal election, whether that election is primary, general, special, or runoff.
The Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act provides generally that states shall “permit absent uniformed services voters and overseas voters to use absentee registration procedures and to vote by absentee ballot in general, special, primary, and runoff elections for Federal office” and “establish procedures for transmitting [absentee ballots] by mail and electronically” to these voters before “general, special, primary, and runoff elections for Federal office.” 152 U.S.C. § 20302(a)(1), (a)(7). Beyond its baseline requirements, the statute also requires that states extend additional protections to the UOCAVA absentee voting process that they might not extend to other absentee voters as a matter of state law. See, e.g.,§ 20302(a)(2) (); § 20302(a)(3) (); § 20302(i) ().
At the heart of this case is one of these special protections afforded to UOCAVA voters. Section 20302(a)(8) requires that states “transmit a validly requested absentee ballot to an absent uniformed services voter or overseas voter ... in the case in which the request is received at least 45 days before an election for Federal office, not later than 45 days before the election.” In short, when a qualifying UOCAVA voter requests an absentee ballot from the state at least forty-five days before “an election for Federal office,” the state is required to transmit a ballot to the voter forty-five days in advance of that election. See id.
The text of § 20302(a)(8) also acknowledges that a later provision within UOCAVA enumerates circumstances in which the forty-five day transmission requirement does not apply. Subsection (g), designated in the statute as the “[h]ardship exemption,” provides that a state that submits a detailed proposal ninety days before a particular federal election may receive from the presidential designee 2 a waiver of the forty-five day transmission requirement for that election. § 20302(g). A state's waiver application must explain the hardship preventing the state from complying with the forty-five day rule and propose a substitute timeline specifying how many days before the election UOCAVA voters will receive their ballots. § 20302(g)(1)(B)-(C). It must also articulate a “comprehensive plan to ensure that” UOCAVA voters receive and are able to submit their ballots in time for the state to count their votes. § 20302(g)(1)(D). The plan must detail “the steps the State will undertake to ensure that [UOCAVA] voters have time to receive, mark, and submit their ballots in time,” and must include the state's rationale for asserting that its alternate plan will be an adequate substitute for the forty-five day timeline, including underlying factual information. Id. A state can obtain a waiver only if it has shown that it faces an “undue hardship” based on one of the following conditions: (1) “[t]he State's primary election date prohibits the State from complying”; (2) “[t]he State has suffered a delay in generating ballots due to a legal contest”; or (3) “[t]he State Constitution prohibits the State from complying.” § 20302(g)(2)(B).
Also relevant to the resolution of this case are several requirements found within the statute that are directed at particular types of federal elections. By their very terms, they must be implemented only with respect to certain elections. Thus, for example, for general elections, UOCAVA directs the states to “permit [UOCAVA] voters to use Federal write-in absentee ballots,” § 20302(a)(3), and “submit a report to the Election Assistance Commission” detailing the “combined number of absentee ballots transmitted to [UOCAVA] voters for the election and the combined number of such ballots which were returned,” § 20302(c). Of particular importance here is the requirement imposed exclusively on runoff elections. § 20302(a)(9). Subsection (a)(9) requires that “if the State declares or otherwise holds a runoff election for Federal office,” it must “establish a written plan that provides absentee ballots are made available to [UOCAVA] voters in [a] manner that gives them sufficient time to vote in the runoff election.” Id.
The United States initiated this suit against Alabama 3 alleging that the State's primary election scheme was incompatible with its requirements under UOCAVA. Under Alabama law, runoff elections are required if no candidate in a primary election...
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