Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, September 26, 1995 TAG: 9509260045
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
The case, brought by three current and former University of Virginia law students, will open the high court's 1995-96 term Oct. 2.
The justices will examine an intense dispute over state GOP convention rules and fees charged to delegates to attend. The state party charged a $35 registration fee, and local parties added their own surcharges.
The UVa students claimed the $45 fees they faced amounted to illegal poll taxes and should have been submitted to the Justice Department for review under the Voting Rights Act.
The three are Republicans who wanted to attend the June 1994 convention, which was open to anyone who paid the fee.
``It's a better, stronger party if we are inclusive and accessible,'' said Fortis Morse, one of the students who filed suit last year in U.S. District Court. ``I don't want to wall off my party from ordinary people.''
Morse paid the fee and attended the two-day convention. The two others who sued claimed they were deterred from attending by the fee.
``The fee makes it difficult for a whole lot of people, and it creates an atmosphere which is not inviting,'' said Morse, who is on leave from his law studies this semester.
A three-judge panel in federal court in Charlottesville ruled that the Republicans did not have to submit their plans for the nomination convention to Justice Department lawyers for review under the Voting Rights Act.
General elections in Virginia require that scrutiny because of the state's history of racial bias.
The federal court also ruled that private citizens do not have the legal standing to sue over an allegedly illegal tax on voters.
North lost the general election in November to incumbent Democratic Sen. Charles Robb.
``The people of Virginia have never been forced to obtain permission from any government ... before associating together at political conventions and choosing candidates for public office,'' Attorney General Jim Gilmore wrote in a brief filed with the high court.
``There is no reason and no law which supports the imposition of so Draconian a requirement now,'' Gilmore wrote.
On appeal, the UVa trio said a filing fee ``threatens the sorts of discrimination and vote-buying that motivated Congress to ban poll taxes.''
by CNB