Alabama Advisory Opinions January 04, 2000: AGO 2000-059 (January 4, 2000)

AGO 2000-059.

Dear Mr. Masdon:

This opinion of the Attorney General is issued in response to your request on behalf of the Winston County Board of Education.

Whether the local law that governs the election of school board members in Winston County permits the conduct of a primary election wherein candidates for each seat on the school board will be nominated by the voters in the district they will represent.

The Winston County School Board ("the Board") is composed of five elected members, one of whom represents each of the five statutorily enumerated districts. Act No. 65-112 provides that:

[T]here shall be elected one member of the county Board of Education from each of the five districts herein set out. Each member shall be nominated by district , and shall be a qualified elector and resident thereof. Each member shall be elected by the qualified electors of the county at large.

In your letter of request, you state that:

For the last twenty years, and for sometime prior, the method used by the Winston County Republican Party [and, presumably, for the Democratic Party as well] for selecting a nominee by district was to conduct a countywide primary election in which one or more candidates from each of the five districts would be presented and would be selected by a countywide election. The candidate from each district who garnered the most votes countywide would be nominated by the party to be their candidate in the general election from each respective district. In other words, all the voters of Winston County would vote on the candidates from each district.

The local law governing the election of the members of the Board clearly allows for the nomination of the board members by district. The current process, which allows for both their nomination and their election by the county at large, has been in place for at least twenty years. Changing the process from an at-large process to a nomination by district process would constitute a change in voting laws that would require preclearance from the United States Justice Department pursuant to section 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. I understand that the submission for preclearance has already been filed.

A change in process by which the members of the Board are selected from an at-large nomination and election process to a district nomination and an at-large election, authorized by statute, is a change in voting practice that must be submitted to the Justice Department for preclearance before its implementation. Once preclearance is obtained, the statute would permit such a change.

I hope this opinion answers your question. If this Office can be of further assistance, please contact Troy R. King of my staff.

Sincerely,

BILL PRYOR

Attorney General

By: CAROL JEAN SMITH

Chief, Opinions Division

BP/CJS/TRK

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