Cases & Actions
Senal et al. vs. City of Quincy Board of Registrars et al.
ELC is representing voters in Quincy, Massachusetts, who are challenging the city’s unlawful refusal to certify their signatures on an initiative petition. The petition seeks to place questions on the upcoming Quincy municipal election ballot. The city’s actions interfere with the plaintiffs’ right to participate in direct democracy.
UPDATED: October 20, 2025
BACKGROUND
Following the City Council’s decision to raise the mayor’s annual salary by 79%, citizens of Quincy created the Fair Raise Petition which would, if adopted, reduce the mayor’s raised salary. Despite gaining the requisite number of signatures necessary for inclusion on the 2025 municipal elections ballots, the city unlawfully discarded over 2,000 signatures including the Plaintiffs’, infringing on their right to participate in the democratic process.
For the petition to be placed on the ballot, proponents needed to collect 5,673 signatures. It received more than 7,100. To make the certification process simple, Plaintiffs printed their names and addresses in boxes next to their signatures, as they were instructed to do. However, Defendants discarded their signatures citing illegibility. Their actions violated the law by invalidating signatures that could be “reasonably determined to be that of a registered voter.” 950 Code Mass. Regs. §55.03(3). Defendants refused to certify the Plaintiffs' signatures, as well as 2,000 other signatures, despite most of the rejected signatures being accompanied by plainly legible printed names and addresses.
As a result of the sweeping invalidations, the Fair Raise Petition failed to meet the threshold for placement on the ballot for the next municipal election. By refusing to examine Plaintiffs' signatures in conjunction with their printed name and address, the city violated Massachusetts law and unduly extinguished political mobilization.