A Franklin County attorney who had attempted to run for circuit judge won't get the chance to challenge state ballot rules she said discriminate against women who wish to use both their married and maiden names when running for office, after a state appeals panel ruled the lawsuit is moot because the 2024 election is past.
On Dec. 31, a three-justice panel of the Illinois Fourth District Appellate Court dismissed the legal action brought by would-be judicial candidate Vanessa Minson-Minor in her attempt to overturn a lower court's ruling earlier in 2024 blocking her from the ballot.
Minson-Minor had filed to run in the Republican primary election for a judgeship in Illinois' Second Judicial Circuit, which includes Franklin County and 11 other southeastern Illinois counties.
She was one of five candidates who filed to run for the judicial vacancy.
However, she was one of three candidates whose spot on the ballot was challenged by a man identified as John Overturf.
While other objections were grounded in residency claims, Overturf challenged Minson-Minor's use of her hyphenated name.
In his filings, Overturf argued Minson-Minor “improperly hyphenated her surname to add an additional name in an apparent attempt to gain voter recognition or appeal.”
He said Minson-Minor violated state election law which states: “In the designation of the name of a candidate on a petition for nomination or certificate of nomination the candidate’s given name or names, initial or initials, a nickname by which the candidate is commonly known, or a combination thereof, may be used in addition to the candidate’s surname.”
Overturf claimed the attorney was known as "Vanessa Minson," and was not known either legally or professionally by the combination of her married and maiden names.
Overturf's objections were sustained by the Illinois State Board of Elections.
Her attempt to reverse the ISBE decision was also rejected by Sangamon County Circuit Court Judge Jack D. Davis II.
Minson-Minor challenged the contrary rulings, in part, by arguing the state law concerning the use of candidate names unconstitutionally discriminates against women, because it restricts the ability of female candidates to use legal names by which they currently or in the past have been known.
She noted some people in Franklin County have known her as "Vanessa Minson," while others know her as "Vanessa Minor."
Judge Davis and election board, however, both agreed Minson-Minor's inability to show she had ever been known as "Vanessa Minson-Minor" undercuts her ability to secure a spot on the ballot under that name.
Minson-Minor appealed the ruling to the Fourth District Appellate Court in Springfield, continuing to argue her name was wrongly excluded from the ballot, in part, under an illegally discriminatory ballot access rule.
The Fourth District court, however, declined to rule on any of Minson-Minor's claims.
Rather, they found her case was moot, because the 2024 primary and general elections have passed, and Minson-Minor essentially ran out of time to complete her challenge to the election law she believed unconstitutionally was used to block her from the ballot.
"No resolution to this case will allow Minson-Minor to run for office in an election that has already ended. Her name cannot be added to the ballot because the primary election took place on March 19, 2024, and the general election took place on November 05, 2024," the justices wrote.
They acknowledged Minson-Minor's claims represent a "matter of first impression," and that courts have not ruled on the kind of challenge Minson-Minor had presented.
But they said such potentially weighty legal questions are still not enough to justify taking up Minson-Minor's case, when she cannot run for an election in the past.
The decision was authored by Illinois Fourth District Appellate Justice David L. Vancil Jr. Justices Peter C. Cavanagh and Robert J. Steigmann concurred in the ruling.
The ruling was issued as an unpublished order under Supreme Court Rule 23, which may limit its use as precedent.