Mississippi Advisory Opinions January 14, 2011: No. 2010-00684 (January 14, 2011)

No. 2010-00684.

Dear Mr. Bridgforth:

Attorney General Jim Hood has received your request for an official opinion and has assigned it to me for research and reply.

May a voter living within the Yazoo City Municipal School District qualify as a candidate for Superintendent of Education for Yazoo County School District, despite the fact that such a voter may not participate in the voting for such office?

Yes.

Section 37-5-71 of the Mississippi Code Annotated (1972)provides for the election and qualification of candidates for county superintendent of education and prohibits electors in specifically described counties from participating in the election of the county superintendent of education.

Subsection (2) of that statute prohibits the qualified electors who reside in separate municipal school districts in certain described counties from participating in the election of the county superintendent of education. However, it further provides that "(I)n any such county, however, the county superintendent of education may be a resident of a municipal separate school district or special municipal separate school district."

While Yazoo County is not one of the specifically described counties, the United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi, Western Division, in Walker and Owen v. Poole et al. , Civil Action File No. 5:99cv80BrS (May 24, 1999), ruled that allowing residents of the Yazoo City Municipal School District to vote for the county superintendent of education is unconstitutional and violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Court permanently enjoined the Yazoo County Election Commission and their successors in office from permitting residents of the Yazoo City Municipal School District from voting in any election for Yazoo County Superintendent of Education.

The language of Subsection (2) of Section 37-5-71 clearly contemplates that a resident of a municipal separate school district or special municipal separate school district may qualify as a candidate for county superintendent of education but is prohibited from voting in such election. Thus, we are of the opinion that a qualified elector of the Yazoo City Municipal School District may qualify as a candidate for the office of Yazoo County Superintendent of Education but is prohibited from voting in such election pursuant to the ruling of the U.S. District Court, Southern District of Mississippi, Western Division, in Walker and Owen v. Poole, et al. , Civil Action File No. 5:99cv80BrS (May 24, 1999).

Please contact our office if we may be of further assistance.

Very truly yours,

JIM HOOD, ATTORNEY GENERAL

By:

Margarette L. Meeks

Special Assistant Attorney General