Inquirer Editorial: N.J. should change candidate-residency law

It can't be fair to drop a rule for more than a decade and then apply it to a single person. But that's what has happened to Gabriela Mosquera, who hasn't been allowed to take the seat in the New Jersey Assembly that she won in November.

Mosquera followed all of the state's enforced rules for candidates when she ran as a Democrat to represent the Fourth District, which covers parts of Gloucester and Camden Counties. She had lived in the state for more than two years and was a legal voter over age 21.

New Jersey's ultimate election authority, the secretary of state, certified her as a candidate in August and as the winner in November. But in December, the losing candidate, Republican Shelly Lovett, contested the election and got a judge to agree that Mosquera failed the residency test of having lived in the district one year prior to the election.

Although Mosquera, born in Ecuador, has lived in New Jersey since she was a toddler, she moved into the Fourth District only 11 months prior to the election. But so what? The one-year residency rule for Assembly candidates hasn't been applied in New Jersey since it was ruled unconstitutional by a federal judge a decade ago. New Jersey never appealed that decision, and lawmakers and voters never amended the state constitution to clarify the rule. In the interim, the Attorney General's Office told candidates not to worry about it.

A state appeals court overruled the judge who said Mosquera had failed to meet the residency requirement, but less than an hour before she was to be sworn into office last week, the state Supreme Court said she had to wait at least until it holds a hearing on the case scheduled for Friday.

In a video distributed by her fellow Democrats, Mosquera says: "My Republican opponent is trying to change the rules of the game after the game has already been played." That sure sounds right. The time for Lovett's complaint was when Mosquera filed as a candidate.

The fair thing for the Supreme Court to do is listen to the people of the Fourth District, who chose Mosquera above Lovett. The Legislature should address the constitutional validity of the residency rule. But that shouldn't prevent Mosquera from being seated. She won fair and square following the same rules used by the secretary of state to certify all winners.