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Confusion of Person and Office
Tuesday, October 5th, 2010
Robert Wechsler
In the Indiana Secretary of State race, the headlines are all about
voter
fraud. But the bigger problem, I think, involves the failure of one of
the candidates to differentiate himself from his seat on the Fishers
city council.
According to an article in the Indianapolis Star, although the candidate closed on a condo outside of his council district in February, he did not resign his council position until September 21, the day before a press conference was to be held on the subject of his residency. On the other hand, he had changed his voter registration four days before the closing, not to his new address, but to his old address in his district, where his divorced wife lives (he remarried in May, according to an article in the Courier-Press).
The candidate said, "Because of my statewide campaign for secretary of state and recent marriage, I failed to realize my new residence was outside my council district. Once notified of the situation, I took immediate action to correct the issue."
However, the candidate wasn't too busy to change his residence back to his old house when he bought a condo outside his district. The story is unbelievable, and has been criticized by individuals from both parties.
The real problem here, from a local government ethics point of view, is the candidate's apparent belief that he had some personal right to hold on to his position, for whatever purpose. No one has a personal right to hold on to any government position. What an elected official has is a fiduciary obligation to his constituents to let them know if circumstances change, after being elected, that prevent him from legally representing them.
Confusion of person and office is central to many local government ethics violations. It is especially important to local government attorneys' role in ethics violations, when they act as if they represent the person rather than the office.
It's fascinating how much emphasis is being placed on the alleged voter fraud — because that is a big issue lately and because the candidate's party has better arguments in defense of this issue — and how little emphasis is being placed on an elected official illegally holding on to his office for six months. Only the Advance Indiana blog, which is run by someone of the same party as the candidate, focused on this issue, but even it emphasized the deception rather than the illegal holding of office.
For another example of an elected official wrongfully holding on to office, see this recent blog post.
Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics
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According to an article in the Indianapolis Star, although the candidate closed on a condo outside of his council district in February, he did not resign his council position until September 21, the day before a press conference was to be held on the subject of his residency. On the other hand, he had changed his voter registration four days before the closing, not to his new address, but to his old address in his district, where his divorced wife lives (he remarried in May, according to an article in the Courier-Press).
The candidate said, "Because of my statewide campaign for secretary of state and recent marriage, I failed to realize my new residence was outside my council district. Once notified of the situation, I took immediate action to correct the issue."
However, the candidate wasn't too busy to change his residence back to his old house when he bought a condo outside his district. The story is unbelievable, and has been criticized by individuals from both parties.
The real problem here, from a local government ethics point of view, is the candidate's apparent belief that he had some personal right to hold on to his position, for whatever purpose. No one has a personal right to hold on to any government position. What an elected official has is a fiduciary obligation to his constituents to let them know if circumstances change, after being elected, that prevent him from legally representing them.
Confusion of person and office is central to many local government ethics violations. It is especially important to local government attorneys' role in ethics violations, when they act as if they represent the person rather than the office.
It's fascinating how much emphasis is being placed on the alleged voter fraud — because that is a big issue lately and because the candidate's party has better arguments in defense of this issue — and how little emphasis is being placed on an elected official illegally holding on to his office for six months. Only the Advance Indiana blog, which is run by someone of the same party as the candidate, focused on this issue, but even it emphasized the deception rather than the illegal holding of office.
For another example of an elected official wrongfully holding on to office, see this recent blog post.
Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics
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