Support a Senate Vacancy Law
It’s a new legislative session, which means it’s time for the Senate Vacancy Law to come roaring back into style. Last year, legislative leaders downplayed expectations of the bill’s passage, but this year it’s looking much more favorable.
You can contact your State Reps and State Senators on the bill — currently known as H.B. 5829 and introduced by Rep. Tim O’Brien.
You can also contact the House and Senate leadership (House Speaker Donovan, Majority Leader Merrill, and Senate President Williams), as well as Government Administration and Elections chairs Gayle Slossberg and James Spallone.
Or, you can get your Town Committee to endorse this well-made resolution drafted up by the Hampton DTC, available below the fold.
A Resolution To Ensure Senatorial Vacancy Equity
WHEREAS the Hampton Democratic Committee believes without reservation or qualification in the democratic process,
WHEREAS the Hampton Democratic Committee believes without reservation or qualification that the most important objective of the democratic process is free and unfettered expression of the will of the peoples of the State of Connecticut;
WHEREAS the best available means of determining the will of the people within state and federal Constitutional principals is an open and fair electoral process
WHEREAS the Hampton Democratic Committee believes that all elected public offices should reflect the will of the broadest group of residents of the state as is possible under all circumstances
WHEREAS the current legal construct for the replacement of a US Senator in the event of vacancy is for a single individual, the Governor of the State of Connecticut, to appoint an individual to fill the vacancy
WHEREAS this legal construct flies in the face of the democratic process, the free and fair expression of the will of the people of the state of Connecticut and the universally accepted state and federal constitutional principals of the representative government
WHEREAS there exists under law provision for replacement of vacancy for members of the US House of Representatives that serve the basic principals of democracy;
THERFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the Hampton Democratic Committee requests that the President of the Connecticut Senate, the Speaker of the Connecticut House of Representatives and the relevant Legislative Committees of the State of Connecticut introduce legislation to amend section 9-211 of the Connecticut General Statutes to change the process for filling a vacancy in the office of Senator in Congress to make the process the same as that used to fill vacancies for the office of Representative in Congress.