POLS ON THE STREET: Judges of Election Caught up In Court Tangles

by Joe Shaheeli
Left without a voice in their own business are Democratic elected judges of election. And there are more than 1,000 of them.

For years they’ve had to hold curbside elections prior to opening their polling places on election morning. Needed to be filled were the election board posts of minority inspector and minority inspector clerk. Both are paying positions.

Until a half-dozen years ago, the Republican City Committee did not press its leaders in wards heavily dominated by Democratic registrations to try to find registered Republicans to fill those two positions.

But a rejuvenated GOP leadership has begun to make such an effort. Scores of minority inspector and clerk posts were filled from among the GOP faithful in those wards. Of course, this was not done without outcries from Democratic judges of election who found those

Democrats they had routinely elected to fill those vacancies were now out of an election payday job. That hurt, since those jobs usually went to neighbors in need or seniors looking for a day to be involved in the election process. In many cases, they had held those positions for years.

Nevertheless, judges fighting the hardest were told in no uncertain terms by the City Commissioners, the DA, and the Committee of 70 they had to relinquish those seats to those registered by the City Republican Party.

Now, with a lot at stake in the outcome of this presidential election, Republican leaders find they are hard pressed to find registered voters within the ward or county to fill those board positions. So they need watchers, Republicans registered in Philadelphia County to bring a presence to a polling place totally dominated by Democrats.

A case is now in federal court requiring an immediate hearing and decision, filed by eight Pennsylvania voters from different parts of the state, together with the Republican Party of Pennsylvania, seeking an order declaring the Election Code provision limiting poll watchers to serve only in the counties where they reside is a violation of the United States Constitution and the Pennsylvania Constitution, as it restricts 1st Amendment rights and denies people equal protection. The suit wants the Court to allow poll watchers appointed under the Election Code to serve in any election district in the Commonwealth.

Since 1937, the Pennsylvania Election Code has specifically allowed poll watchers representing candidates and political parties to observe the election-day process. The law authorizes the role of poll watchers as part of the Commonwealth’s public policy of ensuring the transparency of our election process and as a right under both the US and Pennsylvania Constitutions.

Republican leadership contends this suit is not about election fraud, but about enforcing constitutional rights and Pennsylvania’s law that has permitted poll watchers for over 75 years to observe the process inside the polling place. If approved, it could allow the RCC to tap into a rich vein of Republican election-board workers for many parts of Philadelphia.

To reinforce that all persons and parties recognize the important value of poll watchers in the election process, the State Government Committee of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives recently unanimously approved and recommended legislation

that would grant all poll watchers the right to serve anywhere in the Commonwealth. Unsurprisingly, it had bipartisan support. Seems there are counties where Democrats are as scarce as Republicans in some of Philly’s wards.

But, as one judge of election explained in frustration, “So this election goes by; I lost my two minority jobs on my board; and next election, the Republicans won’t bother staffing my division. I have to start recruiting all over again.”