The GOP should pick another SOS candidate before the filing deadline

by Andrew Horning

Article 6, Section I of the Constitution of the State of Indiana says of Secretary, Auditor and Treasurer of State candidates: “no person shall be eligible to either (sic) of said offices, more than eight years in any period of twelve years.”

Connie Lawson was appointed to the position in April 2012, and was elected to a full term in 2014.  So she’s already held the office for more than 6 years.  She is seeking reelection to another four-year term.  Constitutionally, she is ineligible.

Now, since there is already at least one attorney working on a defense of this obvious violation of constitutional term limits, this is obviously yet another premeditated attempt to violate the law, win a fight in both court and electoral politics, and get away with it.

I have nothing against Connie Lawson or her thirty years of public service.  Some of the finest people I know are Republicans, I have run for office as a Republican myself, and this is no attack on the party or the people in it.  I am sorry that I have to be the one to point this out.  I was hoping someone of principle would’ve dealt with this properly by now.

But this is a matter of fundamental law, and the principle that the greater the power, the greater the accountability to law really ought to be.  We have for too long gotten this backwards.  It shouldn’t be only us little folk who must obey laws.

This intentional violation of constitutional term limits is, at the least, an underhanded gambit to groom and appoint the next SOS by the GOP leadership, thereby conferring the enormous advantages of incumbency to the next GOP candidate for this office.

All polls ever done on the subject of term limits show that most people want more term limits than we currently have…certainly not fewer.  I can’t imagine anyone wants existing limits violated.  And a good part of people’s desire for term limits is to minimize the power of incumbency and partisan games as appears to be brewing here.

So, as a matter of law, public preference, and point of principle, the GOP ought to thank Connie for her service, and appoint another candidate for SOS before the deadline for doing so passes.