Dale Back on Miss. Democratic Ballot

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Mississippi’s longtime insurance commissioner, George Dale, is back on the Democratic Party primary ballot.

Calhoun County Circuit Judge Henry Lackey on Monday reversed a Democratic Executive Committee decision that had removed Dale from the Aug. 7 party primary.

Lackey said he does not have the power to let Dale run as an independent – a request Dale made weeks after the Democratic Executive Committee, on a split vote, said the commissioner shouldn’t run under the party label because he publicly supported President Bush for re-election in 2004.

“This court does not have the power or authority to change the law,” Lackey wrote.

Candidates’ filing deadline for Mississippi elections was March 1. The committee’s decision to remove Dale from the Democratic primary came about two weeks later.

Dale filed a lawsuit challenging the decision. Party officials offered to let Dale back on the ballot, but Dale asked Lackey for permission to run as an independent. Dale’s attorney said news coverage over the commissioner’s party status could hurt him at the polls.

Dale, of Clinton, faces former state fiscal officer Gary Anderson of Jackson and Jim Raspberry of Laurel in the Democratic primary. The Republicans running for insurance commissioner are state Sen. Mike Chaney of Vicksburg and Ronnie D. English of Vancleave.

The general election is Nov. 6.

“Everywhere I go I’ve had people tell me, a lot of them are longtime Democrats who tell me, ‘The party has done you wrong. I’m going to vote for you,”‘ Dale told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from West Point, where he had just made his fourth public appearance of the day.

Anderson and Raspberry are not on the Democratic executive committee and were not involved in the vote to remove Dale from the ballot.

“I’m glad to hear that Mr. Dale is getting his legal woes behind him,” Anderson said Monday. “We have been focused on running our race, and we look forward to facing him in the Democratic primary.”

Dale is the nation’s longest-serving elected state insurance commissioner. He first won the office in November 1975 and took office in January 1976. He has always run as a Democrat, though he has said he doesn’t believe the commissioner’s job ought to necessarily require a candidate to run under a party label.