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Nos. 56 & 58
of fraud and Ms. Seawright has substantially complied with the obligations of the Election
Law. Therefore, her designating petitions should be validated.
Because we must apply a substantial compliance standard to the deficiencies in Ms.
Seawright’s petition, the question here is not whether – in an ordinary election cycle – Ms.
Seawright’s delays in filing might or might not substantially comply with the Election Law,
but rather whether Ms. Seawright substantially complied with the Election Law under the
totality of the extraordinary circumstances facing her. Those anomalous circumstances
require us to affirm the First Department’s narrow decision finding Ms. Seawright
substantially complied with the Election Law. A careful examination of the changes to the
Election Law over time supports that outcome and demonstrates the majority’s clear error
in failing to consider the meaning of “substantial compliance” in Ms. Seawright’s case.
To begin, in 1969, the legislature added the “fatal defect” language to the Election
Law upon which the majority hangs its hat (Election Law § 1-106 [2]; see Bill Jacket, L
1969, ch 529). The legislative history of that addition shows that the “fatal defect”
language was added “to limit the discretionary powers of the Supreme Court . . . [to] relieve
a mistake or accident leading to a delay in filing a certificate of acceptance within the
proper time limits” (Mem of the Attorney General, Bill Jacket, L 1969, ch 529, at 2). The
Department of State’s memorandum to the Governor explained that the amendment’s
purpose was to effectuate the legislature’s “inten[tion] that such provisions be construed
strictly” (Mem of the Dept of State, Bill Jacket, L 1969, ch 529, at 6).
In the decades following that amendment, our Court interpreted the “fatal defect”
amendment to the Election Law as requiring that deadlines for election-related filings be
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