Robert B. Sklaroff, M.D., F.A.C.P.

Medical Oncology/Hematology  Telephone: (215) 333-4900

Smylie Times Building - Suite #500-C  Facsimile: (215) 333-2023
8001 Roosevelt Boulevard  rsklaroff@gmail.com
Philadelphia, PA 19152-3041 May 16, 2022 – Sir Thomas More resigned
as Lord Chancellor of England

To: Distribution [Politicians, Media, Potentially-Interested Persons]

Re: PA “Forensic Audit” of 2020 POTUS Election [PART DXXIV] – Act 77 Unconstitutionality
{}

As *teased* yesterday, properly addressing this residual concern prompts scrutiny of a

filing c/o Dems to the SCOTUS; this is probed to ensure everything crucial was addressed.
The summary of the argument focuses on state-level considerations, not federal issues:

Article VII, §4 of the PA Constitution provides that, “[a]ll elections by the

citizens shall be by ballot or by such other method as may be prescribed
by law.” In Act 77 of 2019, the PA General Assembly enacted mail-in voting
pursuant to its constitutional authority. Therefore, the state constitutional
claims asserted here fail. Moreover, those claims do not implicate federal
rights that petitioners urge this Court to address. Finally, this case does not
involve the principle that state courts may not intrude on state
legislatures’ powers over Elector selection and federal elections. In the
instant matter, the PA Supreme Court didn’t interfere with the legislature’s
exercise of its authority when it enacted Act 77.

The counter-argument stems from invoking the SCOTUS via the equal-protection clause
[14th Amendment]; thus, state-level claims can prevail, even as the courts ordinarily don’t
intrude upon legislative behavior unless it’s unconstitutional. Here, all voters must be
treated equally, without favoritism to those who would not ordinarily comply with the PA
Constitution (absent the interim passage of Act 70 and s/p Covid-19).

The counter-argument is, of course, stemming from equal-protection [14th Amendment]

and, thus, the SCOTUS could be invoked; thus, state-level claims can prevail, even as the
courts ordinarily don’t intrude upon legislative behavior unless it’s unconstitutional.
{Throughout, recall “I’m not a lawyer; I only play one in these memos.” Thus, focusing on
refuting the Dems’ filing is prioritized for, otherwise, Hannah Leavitt’s views prevail.}

Here’s the first assertion:

The General Assembly can enact laws on “all subjects on which its
legislation is not prohibited,” including to elections under PA Constitution
Article VII; this is a discretion unfettered by rule or proviso, save the single
injunction “that elections shall be free and equal.”

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The assertion is that this election wasn’t “equal.”

Only “[w]hen [legislators] have neither exercised their power nor attached
to [a] word any other than its ordinary legal signification” is the language
of Article VII “to be received according to its primary meaning.” [Chase]

They claim Act 70 reflects exercise of legislative power, regardless of whether any word
has been imbued with meaning beyond its ordinary legal signification; Act 70 defines what
it means to “offer to vote” {even if Petitioners claim this exceeds legal boundaries, as was
confirmed in the prior two essays}. Furthermore, the gravamen of their argument is:

Act 77 is an exercise of authority granted to the legislature by a provision

of the PA Constitution [added after Chase was decided, vide supra], that
expressly allows the legislature to pass laws on voting methods. See PA.
CONST. ART. VII, §4 (“All elections by the citizens shall be by ballot or by
such other method as may be prescribed by law: Provided, That secrecy in
voting be preserved.” (emphasis added)). Act 77 is both a product of the
General Assembly’s authority to interpret, implement and define
parameters of the Commonwealth’s elections and an exercise of this
express constitutional power. As a result, regardless of the meaning of the
phrase “offer to vote” during the Civil War, the General Assembly has the
authority to “prescribe” new methods and definitions of voting “by law,”
including what it means to “offer to vote in PA.” {Again, the “offer to vote”
probe has been explored and cannot be ignored, particularly with regard
to whether the voter is acting in his/her precinct; this is another sweeping
assertion that sweeps key info under the rug. Furthermore, maintaining
“secrecy” is problematic when lotsa aberrations have been asserted and
not investigated by the Dem-dominated SoS. Finally, the “method to vote”
cannot contradict black-letter statute when its “definition” is altered;
instead, the “method to vote” might entail a subset of behaviors, such as
using a machine. It can’t rise to the level of CHANGING Article VII without
having been adopted as a Constitutional Amendment, which it wasn’t.}

Footnote #5 must also be addressed, for it enhances Petitioners’ views:

Petitioners also misread Chase—and, by extension, In re Contested

Election in Fifth Ward of Lancaster City—in arguing the PA Constitution
prohibits the method of mail-in voting. Chase addressed where an “offer
to vote” takes place. Its holding was rooted not in voting method but the
limits of legislative power. The court ruled that the General Assembly could
not create an “election district” outside the state or delegate election
administration to military officers. (“If, then, the legislature did not and
could not authorize the military commander to form an election district,
how could there be any constitutional voting under the 43d section?

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 Without an election district there can be no constitutional voting.”). Act 77
does not generate such questions. {Yes, it does, for it enlarges districts to
encompass any site from which a ballot could be mailed, regardless of
where it might be sent.} Chase also pre-dates adoption of Article VII,
Section 4 of the PA Constitution. Together, these facts show that any
reading of Chase as requiring a finding of constitutional infirmity in mail-in
voting cannot be correct. {To the contrary, it overtly violates the mandate
that, “Without an election district there can be no constitutional voting.”}

The coda is as unpersuasive as is the rest of the brief:

Petitioners’ two remaining constitutional arguments similarly fail. Act 77

does not conflict with the voter qualification requirements in Article VII,
Section 1 of the PA Constitution. {Yes, it does; the voter is “offering to
vote” from a site unknown, rather than known to be in the home district.}
The Act adopts the same voter qualifications without alteration and,
therefore, there cannot be a conflict. {This therefore undermines the Act.}
Additionally, the Act does not violate the absentee voting provisions of
Article VII, Section 14, which requires passage of laws to enable absentee
voting in “a manner in which, and the time and place at which” absent
voters may vote.” Section 14 acts as a constitutional floor for additional
voting methods the General Assembly must provide, but nothing in the
section limits the General Assembly’s plenary power to permit other voting
methods such as mail-in ballots. {This clause doesn’t alter the definition of
“absentee voting” by expanding it to no-excuse voting; the legislature can
permit other voting methods, but it can’t expand the characterization of
the involved voters by allowing no-excuse voting to be encompassed.
Here, for example, a method to retrieve a vote from a homebound voter
could be enacted, in lieu of mandating a ballot be remitted to the county.}

In short, Act 70 should not have permitted no-excuse voting absent passage of a
Constitutional Amendment; it’s instructive that the legislation had been introduced with
that intent, prior to conversion to a statute to expedite implementation thereof. Recall
that much of the detailed analysis of Supreme Court precedent by Hannah Leavitt wasn’t
known when the bill was passed in 2019; thus, aspersions can’t be cast upon Mastriano.

Finally, it is again advised that all of these newer assertions be meshed comfortably with
the two prior analyses [*Act 77 is Unconstitutional* and *[Act 77 Rejection Follow-Up]*].
Unencumbered by the need to provide complete legal cites [they’re in the originals]
allowed for a “conversational tone” to be adopted. Now that the primaries will have been
completed imminently, the State Supreme Court can either confirm that Act 77 violates
the Rules of Construction for a given statute, or issue a politicized opinion that would be
appealable to the SCOTUS; they can’t reasonably reject precedent by claiming its authors
were “racist” [as the Dems had argued]; germane Constitutional issues must be tackled.