IOWA NATIONAL MUTUAL INSURANCE COMPANY, AND CORONADO HOTEL, PETITIONERS,
v.
LEE B. HARLAND AND FLORIDA INDUSTRIAL COMMISSION, RESPONDENTS
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The Florida Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of Florida's party loyalty oath requirement in primary elections, rejecting challenges that the oath violates voting qualifications or ballot secrecy. The court held that primary elections, limited to party members, may be protected by requiring voters to swear they voted for a majority of the party's candidates in the last general election.
Section 101.111 is constitutional as applied to primary elections. The party loyalty oath does not modify the constitutional qualifications of electors because primary elections are limited by definition to bona fide party members, and a distinction exists between general elections (open to all qualified electors) and primary elections (limited to party members). The oath does not violate ballot secrecy because it merely tests the bona fides of party membership without disclosing the specific candidates for whom the elector voted.
“It is universally recognized that where the constitution prescribes the qualifications for suffrage, the legislature is powerless to modify such qualifications.”
Establishes the fundamental principle that constitutional voting qualifications cannot be altered by statute, which the appellee relied upon to challenge the oath requirement.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligencePetitioner, a registered Democratic elector, voted for a majority of Republican nominees in the November 1950 general election. In July 1952, he sough…
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PER CURIAM.
Petition for certiorari is granted and the order of the Florida Industrial Commission is quashed under authority of Plymouth Citrus Products Cooperative v. Joseph P. Williamson, Fla., 71 So. 2d 162.
THOMAS, Acting Chief Justice, and SEBRING, MATHEWS and DREW, JJ., concur.