Just when it seemed likely that a needless fringe effort to recall Mayor Littlefield over a justifiable tax increase might at last be resolved in Circuit Court next week, the issue has been elevated from a misbegotten farce to a longer running absurdity. Chris Clem, the part-time attorney for the county Election Commission, gave it longer legs Thursday with his surprise decision — without the election commission’s approval — to expand the legal conflict to new and novel fronts.
On one front, he has wrongly undertaken to counter-sue the mayor for the cost of his challenge over the election commission’s apparent failure to comply with state recall provisions for acceptable signatures and petitions before certifying a contested recall election. Clem’s lawsuit, which he filed under the name of the election commission, further challenges both the constitutionality of the state recall law, as well as the state attorney general’s office for its defense of the state law, which a lower court has said prevails over the city’s own muddled recall statute.
Clem’s counterclaims, particularly his unexpected third-party complaint against Tennessee Attorney General Robert E. Cooper Jr. over the alleged unconstitutionality of the state’s recall law, is especially unusual and over-reaching. Circuit Court Judge Jeff Hollingsworth reasonably deferred his scheduled Monday hearing on the matter until February to consider the new dimensions of the conflict.
Tennessee’s county election commissions operate under the Tennessee Department of State. Their duty is to fairly administer elections in an orderly, timely manner as prescribed under state law. Though majority control of the commissions rotates to the political party of the governor, these public service agencies, as an arm of the state, are supposed to function without partisan bias.
So it is unique, if not out of order, for an election commission to challenge the constitutionality of a state election law, which, having been vetted at the time of its enactment by the state attorney general’s office, automatically carries the state’s presumption of constitutionality. It certainly is unusual — if not overtly partisan — for a part-time county election commission attorney to take it upon himself to challenge both the state’s recall law, and to name the state attorney general as a defendant on that grounds. Hopefully, it will be quickly kicked out when it comes to court.