Mississippi Advisory Opinions July 13, 1994: AGO 94-0379 (July 13, 1994)

Advisory Opinion Text

Ms. Sandra E. Baylor, CMC

City Clerk

Post Office 1780

Gulfport, Mississippi 39502

RE: RESTORATION OF NAMES TO VOTER ROLLS

Dear Ms. Baylor:

Attorney General Mike Moore has received your letter of request and has assigned it to me for research and reply. Your letter states:

“During the last municipal election there were voters not on the rolls due to purging or clerical error. The Municipal Election Commissioners added these voters back to the rolls based on Section 23-15-14 (5) and 23-15-159 (d) of the Miss. Code . However, some of these voters were purged by the county for not voting in four years. The county states that they will not add the voters back to the county rolls as they still have not voted in a county, state, or federal election in four years.

My question is: ‘should the city add the voters back to the rolls that have been purged by the county when they vote by affidavit ballot during a municipal election if the county does not add them to the county rolls?”’

Please see the enclosed copy of an opinion addressed to Honorable Patricia A. Keyes, dated June 1, 1988. In that opinion we restated our long standing position that an elector must be a qualified county elector as a precondition to being a qualified municipal elector and said:

“It should be noted that § 23-15-159 provides for the reinstatement of the registration of any elector whose registration was cancelled under the provisions of this statute. Such persons may be either reregister or they may appear at ‘any election’ and cast an affidavit ballot, if proper. We feel that ‘any election’ includes municipal elections. Thus, if any elector casts a valid affidavit ballot, his registration is automatically restored in both the county and the municipality.”

As indicated above, a voter whose registration has been cancelled for not voting is not disqualified from voting but is required to vote by affidavit ballot in any election in order to have his registration restored to the regular voter rolls. Therefore, such a voter remains a qualified elector of the county provided he does nothing else that would disqualify himself, such as moving out of the county. It is the opinion of this office that both the county and municipal election commissions have an affirmative duty to restore the name of such voter to the regular or “active” voter rolls if and when that voter casts a valid affidavit ballot in a municipal election held within the county where the cancellation occurred. If the county commission refuses to perform that duty, the municipal commission should, in our opinion, restore the name of the voter to the regular or “active” municipal voter rolls.

Sincerely,

Mike Moore, Attorney General.

Phil Carter, Assistant Attorney General