Request By:
Honorable Truman L. Dehner
Commonwealth Attorney
21st Judicial District
Suite 101, 120 Normal Avenue
Morehead, Kentucky 40351
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Walter C. Herdman, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
This is in answer to your letter of March 17 in which you relate that on January 2, 1978 you were appointed as Commonwealth Attorney for the 21st Judicial District by Governor Carroll to fill a vacancy. You raise the question as to whether or not you would be required to run for the unexpired term at any time prior to 1979.
Our response to your question would be in the negative. Section 152 of the Constitution requires all vacancies in elective offices to be filled at the next regular election embracing the area in which the vacancy has occurred. The only regular elections in your district at the November, 1978 election are school board elections which do not embrace an entire county and thus would not qualify under the constitution. See Smith v. Ruth, 308 Ky. 60, 212 S.W.2d 532 (1948); and Brumleve v. Ruth, 302 Ky. 513, 195 S.W.2d 777 (1946). As you point out, federal elections do not qualify as state elections under § 152 of the Constitution as also held in the above cited cases. The only other regular state election in Kentucky in 1978 is in the Third Supreme Court District, no part of which embraces the counties involved in the 21st Judicial District, namely Bath, Menifee and Rowan Counties pursuant to KRS 23.020.
Under the circumstances, you would serve as commonwealth attorney until the 1979 November election, following which whoever is elected would be entitled to take office immediately upon receiving his certificate of election and executing the oath of office. Reference Jones v. Sizemore, 117 Ky. 810, 79 S.W. 229 (1904).