Promotional items for candidates won’t be allowed.

By Mary Grzebieniak

Promotional items for candidates won’t be allowed.

MERCER, Pa. — Thinking about wearing that T-shirt with that cool picture of Barack Obama or John McCain to your Mercer County polling place Nov. 4?

Think again.

Mercer County commissioners said Wednesday at their work session that even though a state official thinks it’s OK, they won’t allow it here.

Jeff Greenburg, the county’s Director of Registration and Elections, said recent published reports quote Pennsylvania Elections Commissioner Chet Harhut as saying it is now OK to wear shirts, hats, pins or other items promoting a candidate or carry election materials into polling places as long as a voter does not try to campaign there.

Harhut was responding to a request for clarification of state law by the Pennsylvania Chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. Their request stems from complaints from voters in some counties who were asked to remove T-shirts or turn them inside out in the primary election because of a longtime ban on “electioneering” within 10 feet of a polling place.

But the law does not define “electioneering,” and the ACLU wants that to be rectified.

The dictionary defines electioneer as someone “to work for the election of a candidate or party.”

But Greenburg said the final decision is up to the counties, not to the state, and both commissioners attending Wednesday’s session said they will continue to keep such items out of polling places here. Greenburg said after the meeting the ban on the so-called “passive electioneering” has been the rule in most Pennsylvania counties. He said he received the letter from Harhut last week stating that passive electioneering could be allowed, but added County Solicitor William Madden reviewed the letter and said to call it “passive electioneering” is to admit that electioneering is going on despite the state Legislature’s wish there should be no electioneering at the polls.

Commissioner Kenneth Amman commented that lifting the prohibition would lend polling places to abuses. “Someone with a well-organized campaign will have people with shirts coming in all day,” he said.

Commissioner John Lechner added, “A free and open election means no influence of any kind.”

They agreed to have Madden review the law and said they will take any action necessary to keep the ban in place. Commissioner Brian Beader was on business in another part of the courthouse and did not arrive at the meeting until after the discussion.

Greenburg said commissioners should keep in mind ACLU may be preparing to file a lawsuit against Pennsylvania counties after the election. He added other Pennsylvania counties are “almost unanimous” in their opposition to Harhut’s interpretation and said Butler County is seeking a court order to continue the ban there.

Greenburg and commissioners agreed, however, that no one in Mercer will be prevented from voting because they have such items. They may, however, be required to cover up or remove an offending article. “The worst-case scenario is we have to ask someone to turn their shirt inside out,” Greenburg said.