Purcell principle

First, the court's decision will cause havoc.

The so-called Purcell Principle generally holds that because late-breaking changes to election procedures can cause chaos, federal courts should hesitate before exercising their equitable discretion to alter state election laws close to an election.

Today's decision tramples on that principle of restraint.

As the district court explained, the path of least change in Alabama is keeping the district court's remedial plan in place.

All the predictions of chaos and calamity and whatever just strikes me as the standard sort of sky is falling things that you hear from dissents all the time.

The sky never falls.

Things just kind of go about as normal for the most part like i'm sure alabama is going to figure out its elections things and everything's going to be fine uh and i didn't think the arguments from the purcell principle were very compelling either because as i understand it the principle more concerns uh courts compelling states to make changes in their election laws uh not so much courts allowing states to make changes in their election laws you know close to an election um so if any court violated the purcell principle it seems to be the district court because it was the district court that was uh compelling the state to you know adopt a particular election law and the court the supreme court is just saying Yeah, state, you can do whatever like you're not going to be bound by the district court's injunction.

So if the state wants to adopt a new congressional map really close to the election and go through all the hardship and difficulty of doing so, it's free to do that.

And so to try and c- and c- create this new rule at the 11th and a half hour that now has to go into effect, in addition to it being illegal because this is something that, as you said, the Constitution specifically says that the time, place, and manner of elections are supposed to be done by the states, sometimes Congress can change it, but nowhere does the executive branch have a role, and the post office is part of the executive branch, but that it just can't be done, and this can't be done by the midterm elections.

So th- there's something called the Purcell Principle or the Purcell Doctrine, which, which essentially is this kind of this, this standard, um, that, that the Supreme Court is chipping away at, but it's basically said, "Look, you can't do things that are gonna create chaos or confusion, uh, too close to an election," and they make that window around 60 days.

And this is...

This...

Now, they have full constitutional precedence to do this.

It's known as the Purcell principle from Purcell versus Gonzalez back in two thousand and six, and it holds that courts cannot change election rules too close to an election because it risks confusing voters, disenfranchising both voters and candidates, of course, who've been campaigning and spending money for months prior, and disrupting the very administration of the election.

Missouri already ran its August primary under the seven-to-one GOP map, so switching back to the old two thousand and twenty-two map for November would create exactly that kind of last-minute judicial disruption that Purcell ruled against.

Voters chose nominees under one map, and changing it now would only end up disenfranchising and confusing them.

And it's really hard to do, especially because often people do try to, you know, do everything they can to get a political advantage.

The court has developed this principle, which used to be called the Purcell principle.

Now it might just call equity as applied to elections.

where they've said, in general, we should avoid, federal courts should avoid getting involved right before the election, because that could sort of disrupt the rules of the game right before the election, which seems like common sense.

Nobody has the temerity to suggest that that which is patently unlawful is lawful.

They just, as you say, use ripeness doctrine and standing doctrine and And in this case, there's the added injury, which I think is worth having you unpack for us, of batting away the Purcell principle.

So there's actually in this context, right, in the elections context, another buffer to courts meddling in election cases while the clock is ticking down.

And Even in that instance where the court has happily used the Purcell principle to say, oh, no, we're not going to do anything that is going to increase the franchise.

Here, they're just unbothered by the fact that there is, again, it's a made up, judge made rule, but there is a rule and the court has no problem making short work of it.

Let me start where you do it by again emphasizing, if the courts can't hear the challenge, the effect is the same as the courts upholding the practice.

But if no one can sue to stop it, it's the same as the court allowing it.

And that's what we've seen in these recent cases.

One, is it still premature, or are we close enough that we can decide now? Has the case ripened, as lawyers would phrase it.

Two, does the executive order actually infringe on the state's rights to hold their own elections? And then third, a sort of wild card here, there's this thing in the law called the Purcell Principle, which says we cannot and should not change the rules around election procedures and balloting if we're too close to an election.

Now, we've never been given a specific number of days, but man, 60 days is really, really close for all the reasons Gabe just laid out, all the technicalities, all the procedural problems that'll happen here.

Ellie Honig, always appreciate you, my friend.