By Robert Willmann
After 25 years of not being itself (with a few exceptions), that began with George W. Bush as governor in 1995, Texas has gone back to its roots and is standing up independently by filing a lawsuit against Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin over their unconstitutional election law changes and the voting misconduct those states allowed to happen.
This must have caught a lot of people by surprise, since legal actions rarely start in the U.S. Supreme Court. But it answers the question: when a state in the U.S. has a dispute with another state, where is the lawsuit filed? Article 3, section 2 of the Constitution says, "The judicial Power shall extend … to Controversies between two or more States …." And: "In all cases affecting Ambassadors, other Public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party, the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction". Congress made the authority to hear the cases (the "jurisdiction") exclusive to the Supreme Court, so that no other court would be involved [1].
Supreme Court Rule 17 describes the procedure to be used, which the court can tailor to each case and make it up as they go along: "The form of pleadings and motions prescribed by the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure is followed. In other respects, those Rules and the Federal Rules of Evidence may be taken as guides" [2].
The document starting the case is called a "bill of complaint", and a request for leave to file it is also to be included. The Texas complaint is 48 pages, and the brief in support of it is 44 pages–
https://turcopolier.typepad.com/files/tex_electcase_bill_of_complaint.pdf
A request for a temporary restraining order, stay order, or injunction was also filed, because of the short time frame of the election process–
https://turcopolier.typepad.com/files/tex_electcase_request_restraining_order.pdf
Because of the time squeeze, a motion to speed up and expedite the case was filed, along with 15 exhibits, although two of them appear to be duplicated. It is a large computer file of some 22.1 megabytes in size and takes up a lot of disk space, so the motion is here without all of the exhibits–
https://turcopolier.typepad.com/files/tex_electcase_motion_expedite_without_exhibits.pdf
However, I have separated out four of the exhibits. Charles Cicchetti provided an affidavit analyzing the voting–
https://turcopolier.typepad.com/files/tex_electcase_cicchetti_affidavit.pdf
The sleazy compromise and settlement agreement that was done through a lawsuit in Georgia and signed on 6 March 2020 made changes in Georgia's absentee voting procedures. It was a slick trick filed by the Democratic Party of Georgia, Inc.; the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee; and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. The gutless and collaborating defendants were the Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, and the members of the State Election Board in Georgia. Attorney Lin Wood's lawsuit in Georgia in which he is the party bringing the case attacks that settlement agreement. The agreement is attached as an exhibit to the Texas lawsuit–
https://turcopolier.typepad.com/files/tex_electcase_georgia_agreement_on_ballots.pdf
Gregory Stenstrom provided an affidavit and he was a poll watcher in Pennsylvania. He included photos in his affidavit. He also went to a counting center. He mentions that a person named Joe Masalta took videos and photos of one situation and made an affidavit, but it is not attached as an exhibit to the lawsuit–
https://turcopolier.typepad.com/files/tex_electcase_stenstrom_affidavit_photos.pdf
A letter dated 4 December 2020 from 15 members of the Pennsylvania legislature was sent to U.S. Congressman Scott Perry (Repub. Penn.). It describes problems in Pennsylvania before the election and as of 4 December. The letter asks the United States Congress: "… to declare the selection of presidential electors in this Commonwealth to be in dispute and to intervene in the selection of the electors for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania for the 2020 General Election"–
https://turcopolier.typepad.com/files/tex_electcase_penn_legislators_dispute_electors.pdf
These papers are in the pdf computer file format and can be viewed or downloaded for reading. The Bill of Complaint and the other documents are useful as they start with the changes done to state election procedures by state actors that were not the state legislatures. Such changes are illegal because the U.S. Constititution gives state legislatures the authority to create voting procedures, and not other state personnel, agencies, departments, or courts. The illegal changes allowed a lot of misconduct and voting fraud in the four states — Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin. The request to expedite the case with all of the exhibits attached as one large computer file of 170 pages can also be downloaded from the court's website [3].
The old bugaboo, "leave of court", is in this procedure as possibly requiring permission for the case to proceed, and might stand in the way of a consideration of the merits of the complaint. But in any event, the detail in the lawsuit gets information and facts into the minds of the judges and their law clerks on the Supreme Court.
UPDATE, 9 December 2020: A "[r]esponse to the motion for leave to file a bill of complaint and to the motion for a preliminary injunction and temporary restraining order or, alternatively, for stay and administrative stay requested, due Thursday, December 10, by 3 pm."
[1] Title 28, U.S. Code, section 1251(a). Original Jurisdiction.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/28/1251
[2] U.S. Supreme Court Rule 17. Procedure in an Original Action.
https://turcopolier.typepad.com/files/supreme_court_rule_17.pdf
[3] The motion to expedite consideration of the case as one computer file of 22.1 megabytes.
Thank you, Mr. Willman.
This is a great move, since as you have laid out, state vs. state lawsuits proceed directly to the Supreme Court, something clearly mandated by the Constitution. Time is of the essence, and an argument that the states being sued have all violated the stipulation that the rules for Federal elections established by individual states must be through actions of the legislature, is just what the doctor ordered. The attempts to pull partisan end runs without meeting the requirement of the Federal Constitution could certainly lead to invalidation of the elctions in those states.
And other states are apparently joining the suit, seven thus far, with the potential for more.
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/12/allen-west-seven-states-will-join-texas-scotus-lawsuit-georgia-michigan-wisconsin-pennsylvania/
I wish them good cess.
Take me to Texas
Two hundred years ago
Where a pride rose from the ashes of San Jacinto
It still beats in every heart
Like a battle cry
Where I was born, where I was raised, so when I die
Hells yeah! So proud to be from Texas today.
It looks like “the South shall rise again” is coming to pass here as Louisiana, Arkansas, Alabama, Florida, Kentucky, Mississippi, South Carolina have all joined in, along with the land of Crazy Horse (visit the monument before Antifa does), South Dakota; and now Missouri. Virginia’s AG Herring is notably missing, but then there might have been election issues in VA too..
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/12/more_suspicious_voting_data_arise_in_virginia.html
Meanwhile I hear China has had infiltrators all over the place, including putting the Fang in Congressman Swalwell’s office (and maybe his bed, too).
https://thefederalist.com/2020/12/08/fbi-communist-china-spy-infiltrated-california-politicians-including-russia-hoaxer-eric-swalwell/
I wonder why that never came out duing any of the Mueller hearings or the Impreachment? It gives new meaning to the phrase “We’re all in this together”.
Since the “South” was put under the federal thumb after LBJ signed the Voting Rights Act (VRA) wiping out the last vestiges of Jim Crow voting restrictions, there is precedence for federal jurisdiction when a constructive pattern of voter debasement and disenfranchisement is demonstrated in these four particular states.
VRA was legislative; this is an appeal for judicial relief. However time is of the essence in this case, requiring expedited judicial intervention.
All politics are local. We elected a mayor once shortly after our city passed a “term limits” ordinance.
There was a question whether this new prohibition against serving multiple successive terms applied to the person, or the title of office served. He was a term limited city council person, but was his first term sitting as mayor
The cast dragged on for several years, quibblng mainly over a missing comma. Ultimately the courts ruled against the sitting mayor and he was removed from office mid-term. They ruled term limits applied to the total time a person served in any elected office; even though he had never served as mayor.
The mayor’s election was held while this controversy was raging. So voters knew what they were voting for. They wanted this person as their mayor. Consequently, the express will of the people was ultimately over-turned by the courts.
He was the last independent, non-partisan mayor we had, and our long slow slide into employee union backed election officials started from that time forward. Now our city government. thanks for “election reform” is 100% dysfunctional.
Yet again, “term limits” solves nothing. On a local level, just like at the state level, it created a special interest, one-party hegemony. And fiscal ruin. And a city council who now votes to throw you in jail if you use plastic straws. Many have tried to unseat this unholy one-party alliance in our city, but none have succeeded.
Deap,
LBJ did nothing of the kind. The democrats, however, are busy re-imposing restrictions on citizens using Covid and corporate mandates to do so.
All,
Conservative Tree House reports that, as of today, seventeen states have filed an amicus brief in Texas’ suit against Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, & Georgia.
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2020/12/09/17-states-file-amicus-brief-with-supreme-court-in-support-of-texas-election-lawsuit/
Well, that suit seems to have really hit a nerve with those states concerned with assuring that the rules for Federal elections are subject to the will of the states’ legislatures,and not instead subject to a largely anonymous putsch originating in the executive. Legislative control means that legislators must put their names on their votes; i.e. personal accountability. This is highly significant.
Thank you, Texas, for stepping up, and bringing this action.