Finally a Guidebook for New York’s Impenetrable Election System

Authors

Eric Lane, Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra UniversityFollow

Document Type

Book Review

Publication Title

Election Law Journal

Publication Date

2008

DOI

10.1089/elj.2008.7313

Abstract

As someone who has occasionally mustered the courage to take small steps into the impenetrable landscape that is New York's election law, I can attest to the overwhelming loss of direction that accompanies the effort, and the anxiety and the fear that follow, as one tries desperately to return to safety. And wise the retreat, because, for the average adventurer, courage and fortitude are not sufficient virtues for a successful passage through this dark place. “A maze, whose corridors are compounded by hurdles, to be negotiated by only the wariest of candidates” is how one New York appellate court once described it. And, in the more mundane language of government commissions, the New York State Commission on Government Integrity concluded: “The procedural vagaries of the law are indeed overwhelming both in their complexity and their rigidity” and its collective requirements “unreasonably restrict access to the ballot and thereby undermine the legitimacy of the primary process as a means of selecting nominees who command the support of party members, not just the party leaders.”

Comments

Review of Jerry H. Goldfeder, Goldfeder's Modern Election Law. New York: New York Legal Publishing (2007).

Recommended Citation

Eric Lane, Finally a Guidebook for New York’s Impenetrable Election System, 7 ELJ 271 (2008)
Available at: https://scholarlycommons.law.hofstra.edu/faculty_scholarship/386