Session Laws

Whereas, The deferred operation of this act would tend to defeat its purpose, which is to immediately provide an orderly procedure for the nomination of candidates for congress in the nineteen hundred and ninety-two election, therefore it is hereby declared to be an emergency law, necessary for the immediate preservation of the public convenience.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:

SECTION 1. Notwithstanding the provisions of any general or special law to the contrary, the state secretary shall cause to be printed primary ballots listing the names of each party candidate for representative in congress for the nineteen hundred and ninety-two primary election who shall have obtained, in the aggregate, two thousand signatures on his nomination papers. The state secretary shall also cause to be printed ballots for the nineteen hundred and ninety-two general election containing the names of all unenrolled candidates for representative in congress who shall have obtained in the aggregate, two thousand signatures. In making said aggregation, the state secretary shall count all certified signatures on nomination papers, regardless of the congressional district in which said signatures were obtained, and regardless of the congressional district from which the candidate seeks election.

SECTION 2. Notwithstanding the provisions of any general or special law to the contrary, local registrars of voters shall not refuse to certify resident signatures on nomination papers of candidates for congress in the nineteen hundred and ninety-two primary or general election solely on the basis that the district designation on said nomination papers is omitted or incorrect.

SECTION 3. Notwithstanding the provisions of any general or special law to the contrary, candidates for representative in congress in the nineteen hundred and ninety-two primary or general election shall make an irrevocable declaration of the congressional district from which they seek election, or an intention to have their name withdrawn from nomination, in writing, to the state secretary by five o'clock post meridian on or before the seventh day following the enactment of a congressional redistricting plan which reflects accurately the total number of representatives in congress to which the state is entitled by federal law, as determined by the supreme court of the United States in the case of Commonwealth of Massachusetts v. Mosbacher, or June fifth, nineteen hundred and ninety-two, whichever is later.

SECTION 4. Except as provided in section three, all election calendar deadlines prescribed by law for the submission, processing and filing of nomination papers, or for the withdrawal of nomination for offices other than representative in congress, shall remain in full force and effect.