Mississippi Advisory Opinions March 22, 1984: 19840322 (March 22, 1984)

Advisory Opinion Text

Mr. James T. McCafferty, III

Court Education Program

Law Center

University, Mississippi 38677

Dear Mr. McCafferty:

Attorney General Edwin Lloyd Pittman has received your opinion request and has assigned it to me for research and reply, your letter stating:

“ Mississippi Code Annotated Section 23-5-1 (1972) provides that the State Board of Election Commissioners shall appoint a registrar of elections 'in each county who shall be the clerk of the circuit court, unless he shall be shown to be an improper person to register the names of the electors therein.' Mississippi Code Section 23-5-7 (1972) provides that the appointment of such registrars shall take place on or before the fifteenth day of February following the general election, and that registrars 'shall hold office for four years and until their successors shall be duly qualified.' Do these statutes, when read together, mean that a defeated or retiring circuit clerk remains the county's registrar until as late as February 15, or even until the State Board of Election Commissioners appoints the new clerk as registrar?

“The second question also concerns the circuit clerk's duties as registrar. Mississippi Code Annotated Section 23-5-7 (1972) gives the county registrar the authority to appoint a deputy registrar (with the consent of the board of election commission) 'who may discharge the duties of the registrar.' Another statute, Mississippi Code Section 9-7-123 (1972), allows the circuit clerk, with the approval of the circuit court, to appoint one or more deputies who 'shall have power to do and perform all the acts and duties which their principal may lawfully do. . . .' Does Section 23-5-7 mean that only the registrar and his Board of Election Commissioners approved deputy registrar may register voters, or may a deputy clerk appointed under Section 9-7-123 also register voters if his 'principal' is also county registrar? If the Section 23-5-7 restricts the registering of voters to the county registrar and official deputy registrars, what is the status of those voters who have been registered by deputy circuit clerks acting under the mistaken belief that they were qualified to register voters?”'

As to your first question:

The language in Section 23-5-7, Mississippi Code of 1972, is identical to that in Section 3603 as amended by ch. 75, Laws of 1900. The predecessor statute, Section 3603, Mississippi Code of 1892, read:

“Appointment of registrars. —The state board of election commissioners shall appoint the registrars of electors in the several counties as soon as practicable hereafter, and thereafter on or before the first day of January of the year for a general election and for an election of representatives in congress and for the election of electors of president or vice-president of the United States.”

It appears that the main purpose of the amendment was to set a more practical time for the appointment consistent with the beginning of the new term of office of the Circuit Clerk. From a practical standpoint it would appear that very little, if any, time would transpire between the expiration of the former clerk's office and beginning of the new clerk's office both as clerk and registrar but that the former would serve as registrar until a successor was appointed under the statute. As to your second question: The offices of registrar and deputy registrar are authorized by statute. The purpose of a registrar officially is to register voters. A deputy registrar could also simultaneously be a deputy circuit clerk if so appointed as such, but all deputy clerks are not by virtue of their appointment as deputy also a deputy registrar. As to the effect of a non-registrar deputy circuit clerk attempting to register a voter, that is a hypothetical question which could not be decided by an opinion of this office but informationally we would suggest that such a registration would not be disregarded.

Yours very truly,

Edwin Lloyd Pittman, Attorney General