A Judge Calls the County-Seat Law ‘Nefarious’

A copy of Judge Ballinger’s decision on the appeal of Snohomish from the action of the board of county commissioners of Snohomish County, ordering the removal of the records to Everett, was received in the city yesterday. While it is against Snohomish, it contains severe comments on the commissioners as well as on the existing law in regard to county seat contests.

The hearing was had on motions for supersedeas and to dismiss the appeal. Judge Ballinger ruled that the order of the county board was not appealable. He held that removal of a county seat is a political question belonging to the legislative branch, and that the special statute provided no appeal from the commissioners’ action.

“I have searched in vain,” the judge wrote, “for some rational and legal ground by means of which the court could seize hold of this matter and permit a full and fair disposition of this question sought to be carried up on appeal. I have done this because of the record setting out … on the part of certain public officers in absolute defiance of all law and of any concern for a decent observance of official or moral propriety. But the court finds its hands tied by legislative acts which, if it ignored or overruled, it would subject itself to like censure. The appeal must be dismissed.”

The citizens of Snohomish at once applied for and obtained an order temporarily restraining the board of county commissioners from removing the county seat, requiring them to show cause on January 23 why the order should not be made permanent. The allegations on which the restraining order was based set forth such irregularities and lawlessness in the proceedings before the board as to render the order removing the county seat void—defects in the petition and in the form of the ballots, as well as fraud in the conduct of parties connected with the election and the canvassing of the returns. The final determination of all the questions involved in the contest may take several months yet.