by Ed Naile
We are watching with great anticipation, today’s hearing in Hillsborough North, in regards to Manchester v. Gardner, the redistricting case, or should I say cases, inevitable after each redistricting plan is submitted.
Read it for yourself: Gardner Petition
The City of Manchester, a person apparently, as is Bill Gardner – the Secretary of Stories About Our Primary.
If you notice the title of this case it is called MANCHESTER v. Gardner, not a person from Manchester v. Bill Gardner or Manchester v. NH Secretary of State.
This comes under the statute RSA 507:9: Section 507:9
507:9 Transitory. – Transitory actions, in which any one of the parties is an inhabitant of the state, shall be brought in the county or judicial district thereof where some one of them resides. If no one of the parties is an inhabitant of the state, the action may be brought in any county or judicial district.
“Secretary of Fun Stories” Bill Gardner is a real person, so it is safe to assume Manchester is a person as well.
As a pro se litigant in our illustrious NH Superior Court system I probably would have had a case like this tossed for an improper title.
Couldn’t “Mr. or Ms. Manchester” find a person in a living body, not body politic, to slap a name on this slap suit?
RSA 507:9, mentioned in the suit, says the party must be an “inhabitant” of the State as opposed to “domiciled” in the State. This must mean, if voting in NH is a guide, that you need only a light bill as identification to bring a case to Superior Court.
I’ll try that next time and see where it gets me.
Back to redistricting and Manchester’s problem:
How come we never see a redistricting court case against a town like Hanover where the small towns around it share representation.
More non-resident same day registering students vote in Hanover than live in the small towns around it. That is how the county wound up with a Dartmouth student county treasurer from Colorado who abandoned the position.
What was Manchester’s beef again?