Donald Trump the Megathread part II - Mod Warning updated in OP 12/2/26

The logic in the dissent is terrible. It explains how people who are voting in the 45 days prior to election day are not conducting an election (pp. 33 & 34). If Republicans want an argument as to how early voting is a bad thing and should not be allowed in an election, the dissent's position that early voting is definitively not the election is a pretty good startpoint for them. The dissent goes on to says that the Eleventh Circuit's admonishment that "we are in the middle of it [the election], with printed ballots already printed and mailed" is merely 'hyperbole' and should not be considered. (p41.)

The dissent takes no quarrel with the principle stated by the majority, that Virginia's Constitution requires a double-check before a change is made: That the people be allowed to vote for new representatives to provide an indirect check on the legislature proposing a referendum, and then if the new legislature is still interested in putting the referendum forward, then the people get to vote on the referendum itself. It then completely undermines that principle by saying, in effect, that "if the legislature proposes a referendum on day 44, and you voted in the month and a half prior to that, tough."

The dissent also does not address, let alone refute, the majority's point that the Commonwealth cannot have it both ways, that the court cannot review a referendum before the people vote, and also cannot review it afterwards if the people vote in favour of it. They doubtless realise that that is a double-edged sword which can be dramatically abused.

If I were to put this description absent the context of Virginia and say it came from, say, the Texas Supreme Court (assuming Texas had similar laws to VA), would you really be satisfied with it as an appropriate position?

You are making an assumption there. As is, to be fair, the dissent, given it doesn't actually do any analysis of its own comment given, as far as I know, the Art 2 s9 has never been tested. It's an old law, and it's quite possible that a literal interpretation is nonsensical in practice, just it never got updated to reflect current practices.

It very obviously refers only to the state military, as shown twice 1) In that the state has no jurisdiction over the federal government's organs. 2) Given that military facilities in Virginia such as the Pentagon or Fort Belvoir do not operate at reduced manning on election day, crisis or no crisis. To my knowledge, in the last (at minimum, given it's in the 1902 constutition at least and earlier ones are a bit tricky to read the scans) century the Virginia military has never been called to service during a time not "of war or public danger", and certainly not in the time during which early voting has been authorised. There is no reason to believe that a Constitutional provision which predates the invention of the automobile and is supposed to give time for the individual to vote should not also cover the time the individual requires to get to his polling site. Otherwise the Norfolk soldiers of 1902 could be compelled to military service in Jonesville the day before the election and the day after the election, and good luck to them actually getting to their polling site and back.

Given that in the English language it is not unusual for a word to have multiple meanings and we're supposed to look at the intent behind the legislature when determining which one it was, what do you think was the intent of the legislature when it made the provisions of either early balloting or protections from miliitary service during the electoral process?