Statement on Recent Commonwealth Court Rulings in the 102nd Legislative District I have the utmost respect and admiration for any person who puts their name into consideration for public office. I commend Joe Eisenhauer and Wanda Bechtold for their desire to serve the people of our community. I also commend their supporters for their efforts to make a difference in Pennsylvania. Having said that, running for public office is a contest. Contests have rules and requirements. When rules are not followed or requirements are not met, there are consequences. All responsibility for abiding by the rules and requirements of any contest rests squarely with the participant. A baseball player who hits one over the fence but doesn’t tag third base on his way around the infield is not awarded a home run; he is ruled out. A sprinter does not earn a victory in the 100-yard dash by running only 99 yards. Every candidate for public office this year was equally made aware of the rules and requirements to qualify for appearing on the ballot. Recent rulings by the Commonwealth Court to strike the names of Mr. Eisenhauer and Ms. Bechtold from the Republican primary ballot correctly upheld Pennsylvania law. These decisions were not the actions of an activist court. In my opinion, answering these simple questions should not require action in a courtroom at all. Rather, they could better be decided administratively within the agencies the legislature has designated to handle candidate filings. The Department of State could easily be directed to compare ethics form filings with the Ethics Commission. The Department of State is also in charge of keeping track of every registered voter in the Commonwealth, where they live, and whose petitions they may be eligible to sign. Technological advances have made it possible to streamline the process of validating the signatures of electors. If elected as Representative for the 102nd District, I will pursue changes to Pennsylvania’s election laws to make the process of running for public office easier to understand and to ensure that questions regarding the qualifications of candidates are more readily answered. I am no stranger to failing to obtain ballot access and the impact it has on candidates and their supporters. In 2006 I attempted to get on the ballot for Governor as an Independent. The minimum requirement was 67,070 signatures. Despite four grueling months of hard work, my campaign was only able to gather 38,322 signatures. I certainly did not like the fact that I needed more than 33 times the signatures as the major party candidates, but I understood the rules from the outset. When I realized I did not get enough signatures, I accepted the outcome. As Republicans, we support the rule of law. We may disagree with particular laws, but until such time as we are able to make changes to those laws, the laws in place must be observed and enforced. Moving forward, my hope is that Mr. Eisenhauer, Ms. Bechtold, and their supporters continue to support Republican values and seek out new ways to serve and contribute in our community.
Posted on: Thu, 03 Apr 2014 19:27:44 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015