Texas Cases March 17, 2023: In re Morris

Case Description

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On Petition for Writ of Mandamus

JUSTICE BLAND delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Chief Justice Hecht, Justice Lehrmann, Justice Boyd, Justice Busby, and Justice Huddle joined. JUSTICE YOUNG filed a dissenting opinion, in which Justice Devine and Justice Blacklock joined.

OPINION

Jane N. Bland Justice

Advocacy organizations in San Antonio collected sufficient signatures to place a proposed charter amendment before the voters on the City's May 2023 election ballot. A prospective voter challenges the amendment, arguing that it violates a state law requiring that citizen-initiated charter amendments be confined to a single subject. The voter seeks pre-election relief directly from this Court to (1) move the vote on the proposition from the May to the November election; (2) compel the San Antonio City Clerk and Council to separate the proposed amendment into single-subject parts; and (3) order alterations to the ballot language.

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Voters injured by an election irregularity have remedies to address their injury after the election. This voter, however, asks that the Court exercise its authority to interfere with an election before it is held, disrupting the settled expectations of the people of San Antonio. There is no corresponding redress from pre-election judicial meddling that prevents voters from voting in the first instance.

Adhering to our longstanding commitment to avoid undue interference with elections, we deny relief. Sufficient post-election remedies exist that permit the voter to challenge any infirmity in the proposed amendment and its placement on the ballot-after the voters have had their say.

I

In January 2023, the San Antonio City Clerk received a petition to place a measure on the May 6 ballot. If adopted, the proposed "Justice Policy" would amend the City Charter, purportedly to prohibit local enforcement of certain state laws related to marijuana possession, theft offenses, and abortion. It also purports to ban no-knock warrants and chokeholds, and it replaces warrants for certain nonviolent offenses with citations. Finally, it proposes to create the position of a "Justice Director" to implement and enforce its prohibitions.

Relators Maria Teresa Ramirez Morris and the Texas Alliance for Life oppose the Justice Policy amendment. Relators demanded that the City Clerk reject the proposition on the basis that it violates Texas Local Government Code section 9.004(d) and (e). Subsection (d) requires a proposed charter amendment to contain a single subject, and subsection (e) requires the ballot to allow a voter to approve or

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disapprove any one charter amendment without having to approve or disapprove all the amendments. The City Clerk determined that the petition complies with the requirements to place it on the ballot, and the City Council set the proposition for discussion at its regular meeting on February 16.

Before the meeting, Relators sought relief in this Court to compel either the City Clerk or the Council to divide the elements of the Justice Policy into "single subjects" and to present them separately to the voters "so that a voter may approve or disapprove any one or more amendments without having to approve or disapprove all of the amendments." The City responded that such relief was premature. It added that the City Charter grants the Clerk and Council no authority to exercise editorial control over citizen-initiated ballot amendments.

The City Council met on February 16. It ordered the Justice Policy amendment to be placed on the ballot as part of the May general election. The Council left the text of the proposition undisturbed. Seven council members approved an ordinance placing the proposition on the ballot; three members were marked absent. Had the ordinance received eight votes, it could take immediate effect under the City Charter. Because the ordinance received fewer than eight votes, however, the

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order placing the proposition on the May ballot became effective ten days after its passage, on February 26.

After the council meeting, the parties supplemented their briefs in this Court. Relators added two new claims. First, they request that we compel the City Council to move consideration of the Justice Policy amendment to the November election. Relators argue that the Council did not timely order the special election more than seventy-eight days ahead of the uniform election date, as Election Code section 3.005(c) requires, because the ordinance became effective on February 26 rather than immediately upon its passage.

Second, Relators request that the Court amend the ballot language that describes the proposed Justice Policy amendment. Relators argue that the ballot language "omit[s] a key feature of the law-the enlistment of the entirety of city government in thwarting the state's efforts to administer its laws relating to abortion." Relators seek to replace the existing ballot language stating that "police officers shall not investigate, make arrests, or otherwise enforce any alleged criminal abortion, except in limited circumstances," with language stating that "no city staff, city funds, or city resources may be used to gather or provide information to any other governmental body or agency regarding abortion, miscarriage or reproductive act unless in defense of a healthcare provider or patient."

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II

Mandamus relief exists to correct a clear abuse of discretion when no adequate appellate remedy exists. The Election Code expressly grants our Court the authority to "compel the performance of any duty imposed by law in connection with the holding of an election." We may also issue "appropriate injunctive relief" to prevent harm caused by a violation of the Election Code.

When asked to employ this authority before an election is held, we must first evaluate whether the exercise of judicial power that interferes in the political process is appropriate. "It is well settled that separation of powers and the judiciary's deference to the legislative branch require that judicial power not be invoked to interfere with the elective process." We have acted in advance of an election to facilitate placing issues and candidates before the voters but have not done so to deprive voters of their choice. We also have acted to correct misleading ballot language-if the correction can be made without disturbing the election from going forward.

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Historically, however, the Court has not enjoined elections altogether, even elections "called without authority and therefore absolutely void." Though we are not insensitive to the costs associated with a void election, "[i]t is of vastly greater importance that the courts refrain from interfering with the exercise of political functions." In the seventy years since the Legislature endowed the Court with statutory power to address violations of the Election Code, we have not once used it to altogether deprive the voters of an election.

After an election is held, the courts have a far more robust role to play in evaluating the results and the process by which those results were obtained. The Election Code provides remedies for "elections tainted by fraud, illegality or other irregularity." A party may not file such a suit, however, until after the election is held. Reviewing claims after an election permits the parties to fully present them to the trial court, which we review in the ordinary course. "[A]s a prudential matter, the law is typically better served when the lower courts review a legal issue before this Court does." It also minimizes the threat of judicial

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interference where our jurisdiction to correct the political process is lacking.

None of the relief requested in this pre-election challenge warrants a departure from these principles.

A

Relators first request that the Court enjoin the City from holding the special election in May. "An injunction that delays the election would be improper, but an injunction that facilitates the elective process may be appropriate." While we have granted mandamus relief to compel city officials to place citizen-initiated propositions on the ballot, Relators point to no case in which we have withdrawn a proposition from the ballot for any reason, let alone for a claimed procedural defect.

In requesting relief, Relators invoke Local Government Code section 9.004(b). That section requires a city council to order an election within "sufficient time to comply with other requirements of law." One of those requirements is that a council order a special election at least seventy-eight days in advance of a coinciding general election. Relators argue that the Council did not do so because its order to place the proposition on the ballot did not become effective until February 26,

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leaving fewer than seventy-eight days between the effective date and the May election. Thus, Relators argue, the November election is the first proper date on which such an election may be held.

This same law that commands a city council to "allow sufficient time," however, further commands that the council must order an election like this one "on the first authorized uniform election date prescribed by the Election Code or on the earlier of the date of the next municipal general election or presidential general election." There are compelling reasons to give weight to the statute's further requirement that the City hold the special election at the earliest lawful opportunity. "Election results are often influenced by unique and complex factors existing at a particular point in time, and those who petition for an election may have strong reasons for desiring a particular election date." Giving effect to section 9.004(b) in its entirety, it arguably imposes a ministerial duty upon the Council to timely order the election. The Council could have met this duty by meeting at least eighty-eight days in advance of the election. But by the date of its regular meeting in February, it could only do so by acting with at least eight votes. In the face of the City Council's dual statutory duties-to order the special election at least seventy-eight days in advance and to set the election for the earliest lawful date upon proper presentment-

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we should refrain from issuing a pre-election opinion that withdraws consideration of the proposition from the voters at the May election, in derogation of one of the Council's statutory duties.

The power of initiative "is the exercise by the people of a power reserved to them, and not the exercise of a right granted." This right of citizens to propose charter amendments allows the people to directly assume legislative power and sidestep unresponsive governmental bodies. Permitting that same body to arrogate the timing of the special election through inaction exacerbates the very problem the initiative process is meant to overcome. As the Court recognized more than a halfcentury ago, petition signers, "being otherwise entitled to have the initiative election called and held, cannot be defeated in that right by the refusal of [the city council] to perform purely ministerial duties on the ground that in their opinion the ordinance would be invalid if adopted."

We reaffirmed that principle thirty years later in Coalson v. City Council of Victoria . In that case, the City of Victoria refused to place a citizen-initiated proposed charter amendment on the ballot pending the outcome of its suit to declare the amendment unconstitutional. In granting relief to place the proposition on the ballot a mere thirty-one

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days before the election, our Court held that any opinion on the constitutionality of the amendment before the election was held would be purely advisory because voters may disapprove the amendment.

Even should Relators prevail over the City's arguments that appropriate procedures were followed, it is not clear that judicial removal of the proposition from the ballot to extend consideration of it to the next scheduled election is the appropriate remedy. Rather, it is the post-election enforcement of the proposition that remains in question. "The right to call and hold a void election is a political right that the courts have no jurisdiction to interfere with, but the right to enforce a void election in such a way as to violate the laws of this state

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would present a matter that the judicial power of the government would have the right to give relief from."

Relators seek the Court's direct interference with this "political right." They would have us enjoin the special election, supersede the decision of the City Council, and deprive the Justice Policy signatories of their choice of election based on a claimed procedural violation. Relators ascribe no particularized injury to themselves, but rather point to the inability of San Antonians to amend their charter for another two years. The Election Code anticipates and alleviates the sting of such a harm, however, by holding that any restriction on the "time interval between elections" is calculated "as if the election had not been held" when a court determines that an election is void. Relators' claimed injury is not a reason to remove the proposition from the ballot.

To the extent that the purpose of the seventy-eight-day period is to give the electorate sufficient notice of a special election, we observe that Relators and the public were on notice of this special election well before the City Council voted to order it. Relators sought relief in this Court before the Council's vote. A late-ordered election resulting from

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the Council's failure to comply with its duties is not a failure of the citizen petitioners, like the failure to obtain the requisite signatures or an attempt to alter the charter by initiative too soon after the last alteration. The Council's failure to timely order the election is the result of the inaction of three councilmembers, the very body deliberately sidestepped by the initiative process, and not a failure by the amendment's proponents. We have recognized that "the failure to publish notices and send copies thereof to the voters prior to the election . . . constitute mere irregularities" that courts should address in an election contest after the election is held.

We do not conclude or even assume that the election in this case is lawfully ordered. We recognize, however, that the political branch has put the political process in motion and placed this initiative on the ballot. Given the Council's statutory duty to place the proposition on the ballot at the earliest available election, and the availability of postelection relief, we hold that the Relators have failed to show they are entitled to judicial removal of the proposition from the ballot. Adopting a different approach encourages judicial mischief-to ignore the remedies that the Election Code grants to voters after the election in

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favor of removing ballot measures before the election, based on any irregularity that the Court might divine important enough to stop voters from voting. Because such an approach inappropriately interferes with the political process, our precedent has squarely rejected it, even in the face of colorable arguments that the proposition under consideration was constitutionally infirm.

B

Whether or not the election goes forward in May, Relators seek to order the City Clerk or Council to separate the Justice Policy into "single-issue" amendments. Assuming that the Justice Policy violates the single-issue rule, Relators do not point to the source of a ministerial duty on the part of the City Clerk or Council to revise a proposed ordinance that has gathered the requisite number of signatures and qualifies for placement on the ballot. Under the San Antonio City Charter, the City Council has no discretion to modify the language of the proposed ordinance.

The State, as amicus, suggests that the City Council may divide the Justice Policy into single subjects via its authority to "prescribe the wording of a proposition that is to appear on the ballot." Control over the words appearing on the ballot, however, is not control authorizing

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local officials to rewrite the amendment itself. It is unclear whether the City Council has the authority to rephrase the proposition to ensure that the amendment adheres to the single-subject rule or any other state law. Nor is it clear whether to do so would be a ministerial task-that is, a task in which it has no discretion. Determining which aspects of the Justice Policy constitute a single subject necessarily requires consideration and judgment.

We also cannot discount the possibility that some petition signatories acceded to some aspects of the Justice Policy only because they were yoked together with others. To dismantle the Justice Policy into pieces in advance of the election deprives those signatories of their right to have their amendment considered by the voters as it was proposed. "The initiative process . . . affords direct popular participation in lawmaking. The system has its historical roots in the people's dissatisfaction with officialdom's refusal to enact laws." The City Council's duty is to place the proposed amendment before the voters.

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We have held that even concerns about the constitutionality of an amendment are no justification for it to refuse to do otherwise.

In denying relief, we decide neither the validity of the Justice Policy nor the legal merit of Relators' specific objections to it. Whether the Justice Policy violates the Local Government Code or other state law, and the remedy for such violations, are questions that the courts may resolve in an election contest or other post-election proceeding if the proposition passes.

C

Finally, Relators have not shown themselves entitled to relief in the form of amending the proposition's ballot language. While we have recognized that citizens who sign initiative petitions have standing to correct misleading ballot propositions, we have expressed skepticism that a member of the public equally can do so in a pre-election suit. Such a challenge is available post-election.

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We do not foreclose the possibility that a member of the public might assert a pre-election injury distinct from the general public. Relators' alleged injury from the Justice Policy, however, does not materialize unless and until the proposition passes, at which point it is a subject for an election challenge brought by any "qualified voter[] of the territory covered by an election." Accordingly, Relators have not demonstrated that they are entitled to pre-election relief to modify the ballot language.

* * *

The power of initiative is reserved to the people, not granted to them. Courts must not lightly usurp that power. Our role is to facilitate elections, not to stymie them, and to review the consequences of those elections as the Legislature prescribes. We can readily do so in this instance through a post-election challenge. Accordingly, without hearing oral argument, we deny Relators' petition for writ of mandamus.

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JUSTICE YOUNG, joined by Justice Devine and Justice Blacklock, dissenting.

Today the Court refuses to remedy a clear violation of the Election Code. It offers a host of salutary reasons. I agree with them all-when they apply. But none of the Court's stated reasons apply here because they all depend on the same mistaken premise: the existence of a lawfully ordered special election. If such a special election had been properly called, each of these hoary principles would be relevant:

• "our longstanding commitment to avoid undue interference with elections," ante at 2;

• our preference to act "without disturbing [an] election from going forward," id. at 5;

• our historical practice of not "enjoin[ing] elections altogether," id . at 6; see also id. at 11;

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• the obligation of the judiciary never to "deprive the voters of an election," id. at 6; and

• the need "to facilitate elections, not to stymie them," id. at 16.

Each of those important values, however, depends on a common premise that is missing here: a lawfully ordered election. The Court's reliance on those values requires it to assume the answer to the very issue that is in dispute-whether any special election for May has been validly ordered at all. Using doctrines that protect elections to protect events that are not elections is bootstrapping. When a purported election is not a real election, saying so does not "interfere" with an election; stating the correct date to hold an election does not "disturb" that election; telling the City when the law allows it to hold an election does not "enjoin" or "stymie" or "deprive" anyone of an election. These steps instead "facilitate" holding the election. Following the law of Texas can never be regarded as against the interests of the People of Texas.

Texas law provides strict requirements for calling special elections, including how to order them and when they may or must include petition-initiated proposed city-charter amendments. One such requirement is that, to hold a special election, a city council must order it at least 78 days beforehand. The city council clearly failed to follow that binding legal requirement here. The legislature expressly authorizes Texas courts to enforce such election requirements, which protect all voters. The courts should provide pre-election relief when, as here, the core of the protection will be lost forever if not vindicated before the election and when the request for relief is timely. The need for that relief is amplified in this case because other serious issues are also present,

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such as when, whether, and how the courts can address the contention that the proposed charter amendment violates the Local Government Code's single-subject requirement. All the Court needs to address now, however, is the timing violation. It can and should do so by granting partial relief that directs the City to hold the special election in November, not May.

In my judgment, the Court's refusal to do so is mistaken and lacks substantial legal support. My disagreement does not connote disrespect. The Court's decision does not follow from any improper motive. To the contrary, it expresses a most praiseworthy motivation-the determination to allow the People to govern themselves through the electoral process. I share that commitment and disagree only as to how the judiciary properly serves that foundational principle. I cannot agree that the judiciary is limited to post-election relief in the narrow circumstances before us. I therefore must respectfully dissent.

I

I begin with how this case came to us and why the law warrants granting partial relief.

A

As the Court describes, a lengthy citizen-initiated petition in the City of San Antonio-dubbed the "Justice Policy Charter Amendment"- seeks to amend the city's charter through a variety of mechanisms concerning a host of policy issues, all related in some way to the enforcement of local, state, and federal law within the city. This

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litigation commenced based on relators' contention that the proposed amendment's scope violated the single-subject requirement of Texas Local Government Code § 9.004(d). Whether the proposed amendment is otherwise substantively or procedurally improper, however, is immaterial to the question before us now: whether there is any lawfully called special election at all.

The timeliness issue emerged after the city council scheduled a vote on February 16 for the purpose of ordering the May 6 election. That scheduling choice left only one extra day before the last possible day to comply with state law, which requires special elections to "be ordered

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not later than the 78th day before election day." Tex. Elec. Code § 3.005(c). Shortly before the vote, this Court ordered the parties to provide status reports regarding what action, if any, the city council took with respect to the proposed amendment, and what effect the city council's action had on the pending request for relief. The parties subsequently informed the Court that the ordinance ordering the special election passed by a vote of 7-0-3: seven voted to order the election; none voted against doing so; and three abstained from the vote.

All parties agree that, under the city charter, the ordinance could not take effect until February 26-ten days from February 16, when it passed-because it received fewer than eight votes. See San Antonio, Tex., City Charter art. II, § 15; ante at 3 &n.2. Thus, the ordinance could only effectively "order" an election on February 26-69 days before the scheduled election.

B

Yet the law requires 78 days, not 69. That 78-day requirement is clear and unambiguous. Tex. Elec. Code § 3.005(c). Likewise clear and

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unambiguous is the city council's violation of it-a point the Court does not dispute. The only question, then, is what to do about it.

Nothing is one possible answer. It is the answer that the Court adopts by relying on the general principle of restraint in the context of elections as its justification. See ante at 5-6. I readily agree that election-related claims warrant a jaundiced judicial eye, especially when parties ask the courts to disrupt an ongoing election. See, e.g. , In re Khanoyan , 637 S.W.3d 762, 764-65 (Tex. 2022). But traditional judicial reluctance to disrupt an ongoing election is limited to just that: an ongoing election . There has been no lawfully ordered election in this case, so the principles of restraint that the Court ably summons today have no relevance here. Thus, far from merely applying our precedents and the separation-of-powers principles on which they are built, the Court unduly expands them to hold that we must idle by during an election that is no election at all.

Indeed, we have said that "[i]n some circumstances, litigants could present the courts with a clear violation of ministerial duties imposed by law, which-especially if brought early enough to avoid harm to the larger election-could lead to prompt judicial correction." Id. at 767. The present case surely qualifies. In the face of an objective basis to deem a special election invalid ab initio because of something as basic and clear-cut as the calendar, the Court should say so without delay.

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The violation is holding the election prematurely, not enforcing the election's results. The proper relief when a voter is asked to vote at the wrong time is to direct the city to hold the election at the right time, a pre -election remedy. By contrast, when a voter fears the outcome of an election, the voter must first await the election to see what the outcome even is before challenging it as legally infirm.

Consider an analogous situation: violations of the doublejeopardy clause. The core right protected by that clause is immunity from standing trial a second time. That right will be destroyed if the courts force a defendant through a second trial on the theory that any conviction is speculative and can be reversed after the fact. That is why both federal and Texas courts allow extraordinary pre-trial relief through

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an appeal authorized by the collateral-order doctrine, see, e.g. , United States v. Hollywood Motorcar Co. , 458 U.S. 263, 266 (1982), or through a pre-trial writ of habeas corpus, see, e.g. , Ex parte Robinson , 641 S.W.2d 552, 555 (Tex. Crim. App. 1982). Likewise here: voters' core statutory right to be called only to properly authorized elections will be irretrievably harmed if we await the election before vindicating the right.

The Court seems to suggest that the 78-day requirement is no match for a petition-generated initiative. I cannot see why. The reason a proposed charter amendment is placed on the ballot is because state law requires it. The law channels ballot access in many ways. For example, for a proposed charter amendment to be placed on the ballot, the law has long required petition signatures only of the smaller of 5% or 20,000 of the qualified voters, even in our largest cities. See Tex. Loc. Gov't Code § 9.004(a). If the only basis for including a proposed amendment on the San Antonio ballot was that 19,000 signatures had been obtained, I find it hard to believe that the Court would not intervene to protect the voters from being convened to exercise their franchise without legal authority. I thus fail to see why 19,000 voters instead of 20,000 would be dramatically different than 69 days instead of 78. Both are necessary conditions for calling this special election.

Other existing requirements that channel authority to amend a charter include the frequency of doing so-a city may not amend its charter "oftener than every two years." Tex. Const. art. XI, § 5. This Court (by refusing a writ of error) has enforced that restriction on voting. See State v. City Comm'n of San Angelo , 101 S.W.2d 360 (Tex. Civ. App.-Austin 1937, writ ref'd). Despite the requisite number of

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signatures for a proposed charter amendment, the Court agreed that it was not lawful to hold an election that would violate the frequency requirement. Id. at 360-61.

The 78-day mandate is a comparable requirement that we should enforce when it has clearly been violated. The Court implies that we should simply ignore the requirement because the city council was "arguably" bound to call the election. Ante at 8. I doubt that the casting of such votes was purely ministerial, and I think that the law confirms as much by providing for how to achieve ballot access if a city council, for reasons of principle or otherwise, proves unwilling to call an election or put a proposed amendment on the ballot. But regardless of any duty to have acted timely, the city council did not do so . In such instances, may courts retroactively deem the 78-day requirement to be satisfied even when it is not, thus judicially striking the 78-day requirement from the statute?

A better way to approach a situation like this one is to simply apply the provisions of the law, which are readily harmonized. Both state law and the San Antonio city charter provide for a two-step process in which the city council retains a proper but limited role. Under the law, the city council must have the first crack, but if it fails to act, the proposed charter amendment will be presented at the next available election-a specific right that the courts may enforce. See Tex. Loc. Gov't Code § 9.004(b); San Antonio, Tex., City Charter art. IV, § 41 (providing that if the city council "fails to pass an ordinance proposed by initiative petition . . . the proposed or referred ordinance shall be submitted to the electors on the next authorized uniform election date

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that allows enough time to hold the election in the manner required by law" (emphasis added)).

In other words, we need not regard the city council as a potted plant or an automaton, as the Court does by recognizing nothing but a ministerial role for the council. If there were such an utter lack of discretion, then mandamus relief certainly should have been forthcoming in San Angelo , where the city refused to place a proposed charter amendment on the ballot. 101 S.W.2d at 360-61. The legislature could have eliminated any role for city councils but instead has left it to city councils both to call special elections and to "prescribe the wording of a proposition that is to appear on the ballot." Tex. Elec. Code § 52.072(a). These are not examples of pointless political theater; they are part of the process. A city council's failure or refusal to act leads to a different remedy, which is also part of the process: granting the proposed amendment automatic access to the ballot in the "next" available election, enforceable if necessary by a court.

For this reason, we need only follow the law to preserve the rights of all parties (and, most importantly, the people of San Antonio) by recognizing that May 6 is no longer available for a special election. Contrary to the Court's assumption, May 6 is not "the earliest lawful opportunity" to hold a special election. Ante at 8 (emphasis added). That ship has sailed; it is no longer possible to comply with the 78-day

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requirement (or to order the city council to do so). Absent any other legally cognizable objection to the proposed charter amendment, however, the city council will no longer be in the position to foreclose the amendment from appearing on the November 2023 ballot.

The Court, however, denies all mandamus relief, casting the city council's ordinance ordering the special election as pure ceremony and conscripting San Antonio's voters into the same playbill-but at a cost. Allowing manifest violations of the law is bad enough. Inviting a costly and corrosive post-election challenge no matter what happens is unfortunate, too. But perhaps most serious of all, if the charter amendment passes, San Antonians will be blocked from making any other amendments to their charter until 2025 . See Tex. Const. art. XI, § 5(a). As a result of the special election that should not have happened, other opportunities that would have been available for charter amendments will be gone forever. Ironically, the Court's resolution of this petition creates the very risk it purports to eliminate: the risk that the voters of San Antonio will be unable to vote on charter amendments they desire. I fear that today's decision will undermine the very right to vote the Court seeks to protect.

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C

The Court's opinion portrays denial of relief here as tantamount to preserving the right to vote. If that truly were the question, I would gladly join the Court. The opposite is more nearly true, however, because the real question is whether there even is any valid election to which the voters can be summoned. Requiring voters to exercise their electoral authority when the law does not provide for it undermines our system of elections. Setting a special election is-or at least should be- a solemn act of self-government, not a casual event. If the Court is unwilling to protect electoral regularity even in the face of an open, obvious, and objective violation of legal standards, it will be hard for the Court to stop lawlessness of other sorts in future abuses of our system. Denying relief today does not protect that system but makes it more vulnerable. Forcing unlawful elections diminishes the respect we have for the rules governing them. Granting limited relief would have prevented these real and unfortunate consequences.

I now turn to the Court's rationale for why it refuses to act.

II

As I see it, the Court invokes three main grounds to justify denying relators the pre-election relief they seek: two based on precedent and one based on statutory construction. None of the three, in my view, supports the Court's decision.

A

First, the Court embraces as a chief authority our decision in City of Austin v. Thompson , 219 S.W.2d 57 (Tex. 1949). After citing the statutory provisions that empower courts to grant mandamus and

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injunctive relief to prevent Election Code violations, the Court invokes Thompson to claim that, "[h]istorically . . . the Court has not enjoined elections altogether, even elections 'called without authority and therefore absolutely void.'" Ante at 6 (quoting Thompson , 219 S.W.2d at 59). "Historically" is the correct adverb, because Thompson relied exclusively on the traditional "power of a court of equity." 219 S.W.2d at 59. Neither the majority nor the dissent in that 5-4 decision mentioned any statutes at all. For good reason: not until two years after this Court declined to exercise its ordinary equitable authority in Thompson did the legislature confer the express statutory authority to grant either mandamus or injunctive relief to prevent Election Code violations. See Act of May 30, 1951, 52d Leg., R.S., ch. 492, § 1, art. 7, 1951 Tex. Gen. Laws 1097, 1098.

The statutory authority is no makeweight. As the Court notes ( ante at 10 n.30), we recently observed in In re Stetson Renewables Holdings, LLC that "an express statutory deadline . . . does not necessarily mean that the legislature intended for courts to enforce the deadline." 658 S.W.3d 292, 296 (Tex. 2022) (internal quotations omitted). But the Court does not complete the narrative, because we specifically

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juxtaposed the area of law at issue in Stetson with "election cases," where (again, "with extreme caution") courts indeed "may play a more active part" because "there is ample and express statutory authority for a judicial role." Id. (citing Tex. Elec. Code § 273.061).

B

The Court's other lead authority is more recent and relevant: Coalson v. City Council of Victoria , 610 S.W.2d 744 (Tex. 1980). See ante at 9-10. The Court cites Coalson for two main propositions that only show how different this case is. Reaffirming Coalson does not remotely require denying relief today.

First, Coalson "held that any opinion on the constitutionality of the amendment before the election was held would be purely advisory because voters may disapprove the amendment." Ante at 10; see id. at 7 n.16. Quite right. The whole basis for the city council in Victoria refusing to put a proposed amendment on the ballot was the city council's view of whether the amendment, if passed, would have been legal. This is why the Court emphasized that the council members' declaratory-judgment action "seeks an advisory opinion" and why "[t]he election [would] determine whether there is a justiciable issue." Coalson , 610 S.W.2d at 747. By definition, such an unripe claim must await the election's outcome.

No such claim appears in this case, of course. True, relators (and apparently the city attorney and several members of the council) believe that, if passed, the proposed charter amendment would violate state law-but that is not the basis of their petition and not the basis on which I would grant relief. Instead, relators complain of a procedural injury

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that materializes whether or not the proposed amendment passes: being forced to vote in an untimely ordered special election.

Second, the Court quotes Coalson for this accurate statement: "The City Council's duty [to order an election on a citizen-initiated amendment] is clear, and its compliance with the law is ministerial in nature." Ante at 8 n.23 (quoting 610 S.W.2d at 747). Again, quite right. In Coalson , a timely and properly ordered special election was ongoing . "The election process had been lawfully put in motion," the Court expressly observed. 610 S.W.2d at 747 (emphasis added). Unlike the special election here, the special election there contained other ballot items. See id. at 746. The only question was whether the city council could order a special election but exclude a validly proposed charter amendment that it disliked. Here, of course, that antecedent question, which was not at issue in Coalson , is precisely what the parties dispute: whether any "lawful" special election has been called, given the open violation of Election Code § 3.005(c).

The Court in Coalson was thus certainly correct to have held that the city council members violated their ministerial duties by attempting to block a proposition from the special election-after all, the election had been ordered without any challenge to any statutory (or other) prerequisite for doing so. Id . at 747. Likewise, it is obvious that the properly ordered special election was the "next" such election. The city council did not have a leg to stand on.

Worse yet, the very fact that (unlike here) the special-election order in Coalson was entirely valid explains why this Court was so focused on the detrimental consequence that would flow from excluding

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the ballot initiative: the voters would have faced "a two-year delay before another charter election" could be held on it or any other proposed amendment. Id. at 746 (citing Tex. Const. art. XI, § 5). In a touch of irony, then, today's denial of relief yields the exact result Coalson sought to prevent: the threat to voters' ability to bring charter amendments within two years.

Coincidentally, the Court in Coalson cited State v. City Commission of San Angelo -the case I mentioned in Part I.B, supra - for this very point. San Angelo likewise involved a proposed charter amendment, but there "the city officials refused to call the election, on the sole ground that the charter of said city had [already] been amended by an election" less than two years ago, in violation of the frequency limitation on such amendments. 101 S.W.2d at 361. In the ensuing mandamus petition, supporters of the proposed amendment-observing the requisite number of signatures-sought to compel the calling of a special election despite the timing problem. Unlike the Court's ruling today, the holding in San Angelo was that officials did not have the authority, much less obligation, to call an unlawfully timed special election. If such a ministerial duty on the part of the council existed, then it would not have been "an example of typical judicial restraint," ante at 12 n.35, but an example of judicial unwillingness to protect the core rights of the People that the Court today so frequently invokes.

Said differently, the demanded election in San Angelo -just like today's-suffered from a threshold requirement that made it unlawful. In San Angelo , it was inconsistency with the Texas Constitution's two-year requirement; here, it is inconsistency with the Texas Election Code's

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78-day requirement. San Angelo did not say "well, who knows, maybe it won't even pass-if it does, we'll take it up then." Coalson cited San Angelo approvingly: it was because of San Angelo 's correct holding (that another election with charter amendments would be improper even with sufficient signatures) that Coalson deemed it so important to allow the proposed Victoria amendment onto the ballot at once. See Coalson , 610 S.W.2d at 746.

But the sum and substance of today's decision is to invert San Angelo by holding, counterintuitively, that we must nevertheless press ahead in the face of such procedural infirmities. This approach is simply the election equivalent of the "certify now and worry later" approach we have forcefully rejected in the class-action context. E.g. , Sw. Refin. Co. v. Bernal , 22 S.W.3d 425, 435 (Tex. 2000).

C

The Court's third key argument for denying relief is, in essence, a misunderstanding of the Election Code. That code simultaneously imposes deadlines for calling special elections and denies special elections the immunity from validity challenges granted to general elections. See Tex. Elec. Code § 3.007 ("Failure to order a general election does not affect the validity of the election." (emphasis added)).

Under our ordinary rules of interpretation, the very fact that the legislature went out of its way to say that an untimely order would not affect a general election's validity quite clearly implies that it would do so for a special election. Otherwise, we would have both expressio unius

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and surplusage problems-canons of construction we have applied in case after case.

But, in addition to its unduly narrow view of election deadlines generally, the Court dismisses this consequence of § 3.007 (the "savings clause") by contending that "the savings clause [for general elections] predates statutory deadlines for special elections." Ante at 10 n.30. I fail to see how that matters. Looking to statutory history to see how a word was used is one thing; slicing up an integrated code to deny its provisions the usual semantic cohesion is quite another. We have always construed statutory text "as a whole," In re Ford Motor Co. , 442 S.W.3d 265, 280 (Tex. 2014) (quoting TGS-NOPEC Geophysical Co. v. Combs , 340 S.W.3d 432, 439 (Tex. 2011)), and presumed that the legislature acts "with complete knowledge of the existing law and with reference to it," Acker v. Tex. Water Comm'n , 790 S.W.2d 299, 301 (Tex. 1990). Those two principles have practical force here, where the legislature-when codifying the Election Code-added the deadline for ordering elections literally just two sections before it incorporated the preexisting savings clause for general elections-and maintained that it would be only for

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general elections. See Act of May 13, 1985, 69th Leg., R.S., ch. 211, § 1, 1985 Tex. Gen. Laws 802, 809 (adding newly codified §§ 3.005-.007).

In short, the Court's chief authorities do not support the denial of partial relief. I fear instead that the deployment of these authorities will harm the coherence of our election law and indeed of our general approach to statutory construction.

III

The issue that originally divided-and still divides-the parties is not the election's timeliness. Rather, it is whether, when, and how the courts can vindicate the requirement that a charter amendment "may not contain more than one subject," along with the corresponding mandate that "[t]he ballot shall be prepared so that a voter may approve or disapprove any one or more amendments without having to approve or disapprove all of the amendments." Tex. Loc. Gov't Code § 9.004(d), (e). The parties vehemently disagree about whether the lengthy proposed charter amendment violates these statutory requirements.

We ought to prefer not to resolve on an emergency basis such a fraught question. Nor would it be necessary: granting partial relief on the ground of untimeliness would carry the added benefit of allowing the Court adequate time to consider the single-subject question. After

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directing the election to be held in November, as the law requires , I would direct merits briefing so that our ultimate resolution of the singlesubject question could deliver on two promises that our law makes to voters: that they can vote on what they wish and that they will not be asked to do so in the face of noncompliance with important legal requirements.

Taking that opportunity now would be sensible. For one thing, the single-subject question is unlikely to disappear no matter what happens in the May election because the timing issue will likely keep it alive. For another, the question of whether a single-subject claim is properly brought before an election will be hard to answer after an election, and granting partial relief now would give us an unusual opportunity to do so with comparative leisure. There are at least three important questions we will have to address at some point.

First , is the Local Government Code's single-subject requirement judicially cognizable? Even if courts properly can reach it, we must be persuaded, among other things, that we have access to judicially administrable standards. Otherwise, the dispute might constitute a nonjusticiable political question. See, e.g. , Van Dorn Preston v. M1 Support Servs., L.P. , 642 S.W.3d 452, 465 (Tex. 2022) (concluding that the presence of judicially manageable standards meant that courts could adjudicate the case at issue); see also Jeffrey S. Sutton, Who Decides? States as Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation 258-60 (2022)

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("The nature of the single-subject [requirement] does not demand judicial enforcement," id. at 258, because it "faces a soaring level of generality problem," id. at 260.). The parties' comparatively cursory briefing on this point reflects a divergence about what the single-subject requirement means.

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Second , if the question is justiciable, what are its doctrinal boundaries, and what is the proper level of deference that will allow courts to distinguish between (a) a single issue with related subparts and (b) multiple separate issues? Perhaps § 9.004(e) will assist. If the legislature aims to protect voters from having to make impossible or unfair choices, as § 9.004(e) provides, then § 9.004(d)'s single-subject requirement might still require substantial deference to city councils (or citizens promoting initiatives). Perhaps further analysis would confirm (or refute) the instinct thus far reflected in some lower-court opinions.

Third , if the courts can address the question, may they do so before or only after an election? There is at least a plausible argument that single-subject scrutiny, if permissible at all, should be done as soon as possible. The requirements of § 9.004(d)-(e) appear designed to protect the very act of voting. If the goal is to ensure that voters spend their time and civic energy only on properly framed ballot items, it seems

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suitable-when possible, see Khanoyan, 637 S.W.3d at 764-66-to provide pre-election relief. Indeed, if § 9.004(d)'s single-subject requirement aims to facilitate the voter's right in § 9.004(e), then the single-subject requirement would logically be one that, when timely presented, should be vindicated before votes are cast.

I take no position on any of those questions yet, much less determine how the answers to those questions would apply here. But it should be self-evident that answering them will be a very serious endeavor. These thoughts, I hope, explain why I believe that we should have accepted the opportunity that partial relief would have afforded us to consider each question without undue haste.

IV

I could better understand the Court's denial today if it was predicated on the concern that granting this mandamus petition would break the dam and create an influx of similar pre-election challenges across the second largest State in the Union. This Court cannot sit as a court of first instance whenever someone is aggrieved. There are only nine of us in a State with 254 counties and 30 million residents. We sit en banc in every case. But given the unusual posture of this dispute- saddled with not only a single-subject issue but also with a violation of the 78-day election-order requirement-we should not be worried about the limited ramifications that might follow from a partial grant of relief. If the city council has indeed violated the 78-day election-order

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requirement, which it clearly has, I suspect our saying so would lead more municipalities to dutifully observe their deadlines. Even the occasional blown deadline in the future would lead to relief in the lower courts in light of an unequivocal and easily followed precedent from this Court. Granting partial relief today would open no floodgates.

***

The right to vote is unquestionably fundamental. It is how we remain a self-governing people. See Khanoyan , 637 S.W.3d at 763. But the People of Texas also have chosen to guard their electoral role by enacting comprehensive legislation that ensures the propriety of elections that are called. The People also have given their courts broad authority to enforce compliance with "any duty imposed by law in connection with the holding of an election" through the issuance of writs of mandamus. Tex. Elec. Code § 273.061(a). We should use that authority sparingly- but we should use it when it is warranted, as it is here.

Respondents are wrong to suggest that following the law would "thwart the will of thousands of San Antonio voters." Following the law would implement the will of all the voters of San Antonio-and of Texas. Likewise, I disagree with the Court that following the law would "disrupt[] the settled expectations of the people of San Antonio." Ante at 2. The People's settled expectations are that the law will be followed-that they will be called to the polls when the law so requires but not otherwise.

The Court summarizes its holding with a troubling statement: that "[c]ourts must not lightly usurp [the] power" of placing popular initiatives on local ballots. Ante at 16. I propose a different rule: courts

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should never usurp any power in any context-not lightly, not hesitantly, but never. When power does belong to the courts, as the authority to enforce election law unquestionably does, we should cautiously exercise that power. Cautiously discharging the judicial role here requires granting modest partial relief: holding that there is no lawful authority for a special election in May.

I respectfully dissent.