Cook County ruling may disrupt election

</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[County Clerk Willie McClusky is taking a wait-and-see approach to a ruling in Cook County Circuit Court that may disrupt the election process.

Cook County Circuit Judge Nathaniel R. Howse Jr. on Wednesday ruled Illinois must stop mailing election ballots to members of the military and hold off on sending absentee ballots to everyone else because they contain "misleading and "inaccurate" language about the constitutional convention statewide referendum.

The judge also ordered the Illinois State Board of Elections to draft a notice to voters explaining how information included on the current ballot is false. Attorneys in the case will return to court Friday to discuss how notices will be distributed and whether the ballot will be changed.

But the judge's ruling, if ultimately applied statewide, would have the effect of stopping a train that has already pulled out of the station. In-person absentee balloting began last Thursday. About 50 military absentee ballots were mailed by McClusky on Sept. 17. Early voting starts Oct. 14. Printers are printing -- or have printed -- ballots for the election. Any changes now to the ballot or the voting process would create an expensive, confusing mess. So McClusky plans to go forward as planned, for now.

"We're going to wait until a higher authority than a Cook County circuit judge gives us direction," McClusky said.

If some sort of direction comes from the ISBE, McClusky plans to speak with State's Attorney David Nelson to see how Saline County should proceed, he said.

As they are now, ballots that ask whether to call the Seventh Illinois Constitutional Convention state inaccurately that not voting on the referendum amounts to a "no" vote. They also recount that the last constitutional convention referendum, in 1988, failed. Howse found the inclusion of that information inappropriate.

The state constitution requires voters to consider the convention question every 20 years.

The Chicago Bar Association and Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn filed the lawsuit against Secretary of State Jesse White and the Illinois State Board of Elections. They said the referendum on the state constitutional convention was biased.

If the judge's ruling is applied statewide, election officers will be in a race to keep from disenfranchising as few people as possible. For instance, notice will have to be sent to overseas military personnel about the changes and new ballots would have to be sent out and returned, postmarked by Nov. 4.

The Illinois National Guard is deploying to Afghanistan.

"There will not be enough time to get them back, even now," McClusky said.

If ballots have to be reprinted, the process will be costly and place a strain on print shops. Several deadlines in state law are likely to be missed in the process.

"It will be impossible to early vote by Oct. 14," McClusky said.

It will cost Saline Couty at least $20,000 to reprint the ballots. Just mailing the notices to 1.6 million Chicagoans registered to vote will cost $2 million, according to a spokesman for the Chicago Board of Elections.

"It could be the biggest SNAFU that has ever taken place in the election process in the state of Illinois," McClusky said.

- The Associated Press contributed to this story.