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2018 Midterm Election

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2018 Midterm Election A10 SUNDAY, OCTOBER 28, 2018 THE PRESS-REGISTER AL.COM 2018 midterm election Secretary of State HEATHER MILAM (D) JOHN H. MERRILL (R)(I*) Website: milamforsecretary.com Facebook: facebook.com/JohnMerrill The first point of Heather Milam’s platform is one that comes up often in her messag- John Merrill says he gladly gives his cell phone number to the citizens whom he meets, ing: Empower voters. “Whether you are in Marshall County, or Talladega County, or Lee putting it on his business cards. “If you need to get in touch with me — With me! — you County or Madison County, we just want our humanity recognized and identified,” she need to do so when it’s convenient for you,” he told a women’s group in Cullman County. says in a video on her website. “That’s why voting is so personal to me. It’s because it’s “If that’s not your expectation for the people that represent you at the municipal, county, your voice, and it’s the only thing we really have in a democracy. And people want to talk the state, the regional, federal level, you change your expectation.” about it, people care about it, and I’m going to fight like hell for it.” Merrill, 54, the Republican nominee for secretary of state, seeks a second term. He Milam, 39, the Democratic nominee for secretary of state, easily won the June 5 pri- takes pride in the long history of the office, which was established even before the state mary. was, and describes it as being more efficient under his watch than ever before. Her background, in brief: She started the Birmingham-based newspaper Weld, she’s On the business side, Merrill says that business document filings and incoming checks trained new entrepreneurs, and she now teaches business at the University of Montevallo. are being processed on the same day that the office receives them, and no later than the Other important points on Milam’s platform are to provide transparency, protect voter next business day. files, and make the office more accessible to citizens. On the elections side, Merrill says that 1.01 million voters have registered during his On a fund-raising website for her campaign, Milam writes, “I will infuse the Secretary tenure, and that his office has resolved 92 percent of all election-related complaints sub- of State’s Office with the high seriousness it deserves.” mitted by citizens “I’m ready to go to Montgomery and be solution-oriented, and be a new face in the city Two key goals in years ahead are (1) to introduce computer tablet polling books in every of Montgomery. I think that they need some new energy there,” she told WVTM 13 in Bir- county, to speed voter check-in and eliminate avenues for fraud, and (2) to ease the pro- mingham. “Some new fresh energy is going to be a real challenge to the old status quo. I’m cess of absentee voting, while also requiring applicants to submit photo IDs. prepared for that.” Chief Justice ROBERT “BOB” VANCE JR. (D) TOM PARKER (R) Website: judgebobvance.com Website: parkerforjustice.com Robert “Bob” Vance Jr. ran hard against Roy Moore in 2012, and turned heads even in Tom Parker has been heralding his political conservatism since the April day he losing by pulling 48 percent of the vote. Trying again for the chief justice job as the Demo- announced his chief justice candidacy. “Alabama is a conservative state,” Parker declared cratic nominee, he returns to that battle of 2012 in the opening paragraphs of his website then. “We revere the Constitution and the Rule of Law. And I believe our courts are the statement of his goals and purpose. battleground for our God-given rights as free people.” “Over the past several years, we have seen the rise of politicians who have tried to An associate justice on the court since 2005, Parker toppled incumbent Lyn Stuart to divide us rather than bring us together,” his statement reads. It goes on: “A judge must not win the Republican nomination for chief justice in June. see the world as ‘us’ and ‘them.’ … In short, a judge must be there for everyone.” Parker, 67, is a familiar face in Christian conservative circles in the state, and enjoys a Vance, 57, is a longtime circuit court judge in Jefferson County. In his campaign, he long association with James Dobson’s Focus on the Family. He was founding director of emphasizes that the chief justice is also the court system’s head administrator. the Alabama Family Alliance, now the Alabama Policy Institute, a research and policy “Alabama needs someone who will advocate for the courts. Someone who will work to hub that advocates for limited government and free enterprise. solve the courts’ funding problems as they currently exist,” Vance told a meeting of Cull- As a veteran ally of Roy Moore, notably during his Ten Commandments wars, Parker man Democrats. He also enjoyed a stroke of political good fortune in 2017 — in the form has often spoken up for him. On his website, Parker also makes clear his enduring opposi- of free national visibility — as news networks brought him onto their shows to discuss tion to the U.S. Supreme Court’s Obergefell ruling that legalized gay marriage. Moore’s soon-to-fail bid for the U.S. Senate. And Parker says he gladly stands with President Donald Trump. Parker told WSFA12 in Many voters will remember Vance’s father, Robert S. Vance, also a Birmingham judge. Montgomery, “I want to provide leadership in the Alabama Supreme Court at this time to In 1989, the elder Vance was killed by a bomb hidden in a package delivered to his house. hopefully be a player in restoring the constitution through new conservative majority on The bomb-maker was an embittered wanna-be lawyer, Walter Leroy Moody. The state exe- the U.S. Supreme Court.” cuted Moody this year at age 83. Supreme Court Associate Justice, Place 4 DONNA WESSON SMALLEY (D) JAY MITCHELL (R) Website: smalleyforsupremecourt.com Website: jayforalabama.com Donna Wesson Smalley, running for Place 4 Supreme Court associate justice, stresses Jay Mitchell’s website gets right to the point: He’s a conservative, a constitutionalist the word “experience” in her messaging. and a Christian. “I have 40 years of experience in actually practicing law,” the Democratic nominee “Alabama needs Supreme Court justices who will block liberal challenges,” Mitchell writes on her website. She later continues, “Now more than ever, we need true leaders, says in an ad that riffs on his days as a 6-foot-7 basketball player at Birmingham-Southern. with experience in the trenches.” “I believe in God, the family, the constitution and enforcing the law, whether liberals like “My opponent was 2 years old when I started practicing law,” she told a Democratic it or not.” town hall event in August. Mitchell, 42, is partner in the Birmingham law firm Maynard, Cooper & Gale who’s Smalley, 63, a practicing attorney in Jasper, pledges to assert her independence in making his first run for public office. He convincingly won the Republican nomination for assessing the merits of the cases before her. Place 4 associate justice, receiving 71 percent of the June 5 vote. At a Mobile fundraiser, she said, “If you get 12 good and true citizens in a jury box, I’ll Mitchell is member of the Federalist Society, a conservative legal think-tank that holds take them any day of the week. Sometimes they rule against me, sometimes they rule for much sway in national Republican circles. He serves on the board of Cornerstone School me. But I guaran-dog-tee-you most of the time they’re right. They know what’s going on. in Birmingham, a nonprofit Christian school with a mission to serve inner-city students. And I don’t want some people that have never practiced law for a living, that are living a In a commentary celebrating Constitution Day, Sept. 17, Mitchell wrote, in part, “In comfy life in an ivory tower at the Supreme Court in Montgomery, deciding that the jurors recent decades, the U.S. Supreme Court has made its own law — by ignoring or minimiz- didn’t know what they were doing.” ing the text of the Constitution in favor of the justices’ own policy views and ideas of what Some voters may be aware of Smalley’s sister, Debbie Wesson Gibson. She’s one of the they would like the Constitution to say. This judicial activism flouts the rule of law, makes women who says that Roy Moore pursued a romantic relationship with her when she was a a mockery of our Constitution, and undermines the sovereignty of the American people.” teen and he was in his 30s. The amendments There are four statewide amendments on the general election ballot. Here’s an explanation of each: AMENDMENT 1 AMENDMENT 2 Ten Commandments displays Rights of the unborn This amendment opens the way for displays of the Ten Commandments on state prop- This amendment declares that the state, as a matter of public policy, recognizes the erty and property owned or controlled by a public school or public body. The amendment, rights of unborn children, specifically their “right to life.” And the amendment makes however, expressly prohibits the “expenditure of public funds” to defend its own legality. clear that the state’s constitution provides no right to an abortion, or to any public expen- The amendment notes that Ten Commandments displays must adhere to established diture for an abortion.
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