AG won't rule on Bysiewicz query

Hartford - Attorney General Richard Blumenthal will not resolve the question of whether the leading contender to replace him, Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz, is legally qualified to hold the office.

In an opinion requested by Bysiewicz, Blumenthal said that the law requiring an attorney general to have "10 years' active practice" at the Connecticut bar is constitutional, but deferred any decision on how that provision specifically affects Bysiewicz to a court.

Bysiewicz sought the opinion from Blumenthal after questions were raised by a Connecticut legal affairs blog in mid-January, which noted that the statute outlining qualifications for attorney general requires 10 years of active service. Bysiewicz worked for six years in private practice before winning election to the state House of Representatives and later to the office of Secretary of the State.

Blumenthal's opinion on Tuesday specifically upheld the constitutionality of the qualifications statute, which Bysiewicz's defenders felt could have been in conflict with the constitutional amendment that made the attorney general a constitutional officer, and specifies only that a state elector of 18 years of age could hold the position. That amendment was added decades after the passage of an 1897 law requiring attorneys general to have been in active legal practice for 10 years, Blumenthal noted, and did not "supplant the additional, existing statutory qualifications for the office of Attorney General."

Bysiewicz, in a telephone interview, seized on a portion of Blumenthal's opinion that notes that the state of Alaska has considered active legal service to include "rendering legal services to an agency, branch or department of a civil government" of a U.S. state. She has previously said her service as secretary of the state should count as "active practice," since she oversees a legal staff and offers advice on election law.

"I am very encouraged by the attorney general's opinion because it validates what I have been saying all along," Bysiewicz said. "It gives clarification on the issue that has been swirling about what constitutes active practice. I have a diverse legal background that more than meets that definition of active legal practice."

But Blumenthal explicitly declines to rule on the specific question of how the law applies to Bysiewicz herself, noting that his office is not authorized to provide legal advice to individual candidates and saying such questions must be ruled upon by a court, which can engage in the proper fact-finding. Bysiewicz's claim could also be brought only when a complainant has standing to do so, perhaps not until after a primary or general election.

Bysiewicz's Democratic rivals for the position, state Rep. Cameron Staples, D-New Haven, and former state Sen. George Jepsen, say that means questions will linger about her bid for the party's nomination. (Republican Jerry Farrell Jr., currently commissioner of the Department of Consumer Protection, is a candidate on the Republican side.)

"I've made it clear all along that I'm not challenging her legal qualifications to be attorney general," said Jepsen, a former chairman of the state Democratic Party who said he has been a practicing attorney for 26 years.

"She can't backtrack now and pretend this isn't an issue," Jepsen said. "It's a public issue and a legal issue because she made it one."

Bysiewicz "has some interesting choices to make," he said.

Staples said in an interview that he, like Jepsen, would not challenge Bysiewicz's credentials in court, but that the questions would remain until she clarified her standing.

"I think that people are going to need to know before she's nominated that she's qualified to serve," he said. "And I suspect that this question will continue until it's clarified."

Bysiewicz said she had no intention to do so, and continued to see Blumenthal's opinion as a vindication.

"I have been saying all along that this is not a legal issue, that this is a political issue, and that political issues are best resolved by the voters," she said.

t.mann@theday.com