Hey Bill,

We now have enough signatures to proceed with the
case.  I am cc'ing the outgoing legislators who agreed
to sign.  I am also cc'ing Henry Towsner who will
serve as counsel.

I will send you our evidence soon.  Please let me know
what we need to do next.  Thanks.

-Dylan

Here is our case:

Background:

        During the Spring Quarter General Election,
while students were
voting, three mass e-mails regarding the Presidential
election were 
sent
to segments of the student body, one from the Senior
class presidents,
one from the Junior class presidents, and one from
former ASSU
Vice-President Nick Rodriguez.  Based on the claims
that the sending of
e-mails, as well as any campaigning after the start of
voting
constituted "deviations", the Senate refused
certification.

Argument:

        We claim that this act violated the ASSU
Constitution, which
stipulates that "The Association shall enact no
legislation...abridging
the freedom of speech."  Clearly a rule which
prohibits students from
supporting a candidate over e-mail is an restriction
on free speech. 
Further, a prohibition on campaigning after the start
of voting is also
an unconstitutional restriction on free speech, and
one the Council
explicitly rejected in Case 5 of its 1999-2000
session.

        It might be argued that failure to certify is
a non-action, and
therefore does not qualify as enacting legislation. 
However precedent,
both in the ASSU and the US, makes clear that when it
is standard
procedure to take an action, refusing to do it merely
because students
exercised their right to free speech does violate the
Constitution.  
For
instance, both legislative bodies have generally
accepted that they 
have
a Constitutional obligation to fund student groups
without regard to
religion or political positions, and that refusing to
fund a group
because, say, the Senate disapproved of its politics
would violate the
Constitution.  This isn't surprising, since otherwise
the legislative
bodies could effectively ignore the Constitution, for
instance creating
rules--like the certification rules--where the Senate
has to act to
exempt someone from a penalty of some kind, and
refusing to exempt 
those
with political positions the Senate disapproves of.

        In addition, we claim that the Senate violated
the Joint 
By-Laws
by denying certification without grounds.  The Senate
cited Article V,
Section 9.B.1 of the Joint By-Laws for justification: 
"Grounds for not
certifying an election shall include, but need not be
limited to,
deviations that were avoidable and could possibly have
affected the
outcome of any issue in the election."

While this leaves open the possibility that an
election could be denied
certification for a reason other than such deviations,
it makes clear
that the Senate requires justification to reject an
election. 
Regardless, supposed deviations were the justification
given by the
Senate, when in fact no such deviations occur.  No
ASSU policy 
prohibits
sending e-mails: the Campaign Practices Code notes
that there is a
University policy on the subject, but does not add any
rule mandating
that students follow that policy as a matter of
election law. 
Similarly, there is no rule against campaigning after
voting starts. 
The Campaign Practices Code mentions only an official
start and end 
time
for campaigning, but does not include any rule against
campaigning
"unofficial" outside those times.  This is not an
oversight: the
Campaign Practices Code was written intentionally that
way in response
to the Constitutional Council rulings of 1999-2000.

Conclusion:

        Both the Constitution and the By-Laws
prevented the Senate from
refusing certification to the presidential portion of
the Spring 
Quarter
General Election.  Given this, we ask that the
Constitutional Council
strike down the Senate's actions and mandate that the
legitimate 
results
of that election take effect.



	
		
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