End of an era
Last weekend, the 50th District put an end to the DeWeese era.
The Democratic State Committee held a meeting on Aug. 18 to choose a candidate to run in November in the 50th Legislative District after longtime lawmaker Bill DeWeese was tossed from the ballot last week.
Commonwealth Court ruled on Aug. 10 that DeWeese, the former state House speaker, is ineligible to run for re-election in his old district because he is incarcerated on public corruption convictions.
“DeWeese’s criminal conduct and conviction have rendered him ineligible to hold public office,” Judge Bernard McGinley wrote in his ruling. “Also, DeWeese’s prison sentence will span the entire term of the elected position and, if in fact he won the general election in November 2012, his felony convictions would bar him from holding office.”
DeWeese, 62, is serving 2陆 to 5 years in state prison for using his staff and state resources for campaign purposes. He was convicted of conspiracy, conflict of interest and theft. The 50th District includes all of Greene County and precincts in Brownsville, German Township, Luzerne Township, Masontown Borough and Point Marion in Fayette County, and also includes four precincts in Bethlehem Township and six precincts in Centerville Borough in Washington County.
The striking thing about this entire ordeal was how much differently it could have turned out. Had DeWeese done the right thing long ago and stepped aside, he may have been able to salvage some small part of his legacy. But yet here he is, after three decades of representation, being dumped by his own party because he was too stubborn, too blinded by his own rhetoric to realize the battle was lost long ago.
All along DeWeese has maintained that he was going to stay on the ballot because his conviction would be overturned on appeal in time for him to take office in January. DeWeese’s attorney, Courtney Powell, argued that removing DeWeese from the ballot would be premature as her client is appealing his conviction and could be eligible to serve by the election.
But anyone with even the remotest experience with the judicial scheduling system knew that such a thing was never going to happen in the short amount of time DeWeese had to work with. It was a smoke screen, pure and simple, and Judge McGinley saw right through it.
No rational person would believe that DeWeese’s conviction would be overturned in time. But DeWeese long ago stopped acting rationally. He had plenty of opportunities to step aside and not harm his party’s chances of retaining the 50th District. Each time, he chose the self-serving path instead.
The end came ignominiously, as it took a lawsuit from his own party to open the ballot up to a Democratic candidate who would be legally able to assume the post assuming he or she wins in November.
So while DeWeese sits in SCI-Camp Hill, the Democratic State Committee and local Democratic party officials met Saturday to pick a replacement, marking the first time in decades that DeWeese’s name won’t appear on the ballot.
(Greene County Commissioner Pam Snyder accepted the nomination by state Democratic Committee representatives from Greene, Fayette and Washington counties to run on the November election ballot in the 50th Legislative District. Snyder, who is in her third term as commissioner, was selected by a unanimous vote of 79 committee members in attendance at the meeting.)
Voters who attended that meeting witnessed the start of a new era for the 50th District.