Stuckey v. Richardson

372 S.E.2d 458, 188 Ga. App. 147, 1988 Ga. App. LEXIS 924

• Court: Court of Appeals of Georgia
• Decided: July 29, 1988
• Docket: 77567
• Status: Published

Opinions

Carley, Judge.

The instant case concerns the selection of delegates from the State of Georgia to the 1988 National Republican Convention. Appellee-plaintiffs filed a petition for declaratory judgment, seeking a declaration that they were the validly selected delegates to the convention and that the delegates who had been selected by the appellant-defendant State Executive Committee of the Georgia Republican Party (Executive Committee) were not. Appellants answered, denying the material allegations of the petition. Appellants also moved to dismiss, asserting, among other grounds, that the dispute involved the conduct of the internal affairs of the appellant-defendant Georgia Republican Party and, as such, the dispute was not justiciable in the courts of this state.

The trial court denied appellants’ motion to dismiss and, having heard the case sitting without a jury, it entered an order declaring appellees to be the validly selected delegates and the selection of delegates by the appellant Executive Committee to be invalid. Appellants filed a notice of appeal from this order and moved that this court expedite consideration and resolution of the case. We granted appellants’ motion for expedition. “Because of the need to act quickly ... , we are deciding this case in an expedited manner even though this appeal was only recently filed and argued. This court’s term will soon end. We do not normally decide cases during the last fifteen days of a term. OCGA §[§] 15-2-4[, 15-3-2]. However, . . . under our inherent power, this court may establish whatever rules are necessary to determine the cases which come before us. [Cits.] The inherent power to make the rules includes the concomitant power to suspend the rules in an appropriate case such as the one before us.” Shore v. Shore, 253 Ga. 183, 184 (318 SE2d 57) (1984).

1. The motion to dismiss the appeal is denied.

2. Appellants enumerate the trial court’s order as erroneous on the ground that “this dispute concerns the internal workings of a political party, specifically the selection of delegates to its state and national conventions, which is not justiciable by, and is beyond the jurisdiction of, the trial court. ...”

“Delegates [to a National Political Party Convention] perform a task of supreme importance to every citizen of the Nation regardless of their State of residence. The vital business of the Convention is the nomination of the Party’s candidates for the offices of President and Vice President of the United States. To that end, the state political parties are ‘affiliatéd with a national party through acceptance of the national call to send state delegates to the national convention.’ [Cit.] The States themselves have no constitutionally mandated role in the great task of the selection of Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidates. If the qualifications and eligibility of delegates to National Political Party Conventions were left to state law ‘each of the fifty states could establish the qualifications of its delegates to the various party conventions without regard to party policy, an obviously intolerable result.’ [Cit.] Such a regime could seriously undercut or indeed destroy the effectiveness of the National Party Convention as a concerted enterprise engaged in the vital process of choosing Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidates — a process which usually involves coalitions cutting across state lines. The Convention serves the pervasive national interest in the selection of candidates for national office, and this national interest is greater than any interest of an individual State.” Cousins v. Wigoda, 419 U. S. 477, 489-490 (II) (95 SC 541, 42 LE2d 595) (1975). “It has been understood since our national political parties first came into being as voluntary associations of individuals that the convention itself is the proper forum for determining intraparty disputes as to which delegates shall be seated.” O’Brien v. Brown, 409 U. S. 1, 4 (92 SC 2718, 34 LE2d 1) (1972). “[I]t is not for the courts to mediate the merits of this dispute. ... [A] State, or a court, may not constitutionally substitute its own judgment for that of the Party. A political party’s choice among the various ways of determining the makeup of a State’s delegation to the party’s national convention is protected by the Constitution. And as is true of all expressions of First Amendment freedoms, the courts may not interfere on the ground that they view a particular expression as unwise or irrational.” Democratic Party of U. S. v. Wisconsin, 450 U. S. 107, 123-124 (III) (101 SC 1010, 67 LE2d 82) (1981). It follows that the instant dispute concerning the internal affairs of the Georgia Republican Party is a non-justiciable controversy which must be resolved by the 1988 National Republican Convention rather than by the courts of this state. Accordingly, the trial court erred in failing to grant appellants’ motion to dismiss appellees’ petition for declaratory judgment.

3. Appellants’ remaining enumerations of error are moot by virtue of our holding in Division 2.

4. “We extend the [April] term relative to this case to enable the appellees to file a motion for [rehearing]. OCGA §[§] 15-2-4[, 15-3-2].” Haygood v. City of Doraville, 256 Ga. 566, 567 (350 SE2d 766) (1986).

Judgment reversed.

Birdsong, C. J., McMurray, P. J., Banke, P. J., Sognier, Pope, and Beasley, JJ., concur. Deen, P. J., and Ben-ham, J., concur in part and dissent in part.