The Massachusetts Legislature is currently considering HB 4246, which would provide a new section (f) to the Commonwealth's law regarding vacancies in the House and Senate:
Upon failure to choose a senator in congress or upon a vacancy in said office the governor shall make a temporary appointment to fill the vacancy; provided, however, that the person so appointed shall serve until the election and qualification of the person duly elected to fill such vacancy pursuant to paragraph (a) or paragraph (c); and provided further, any person so appointed shall be of the same political party as the person vacating the office and thereby creating the vacancy.
Should this law pass, Massachusetts will keep its speedy election for a more permanent replacement -- party primaries on 12/8/2009 and a general election on 1/19/10, with the winner occupying the seat through the end of 2012 (when Sen. Kennedy's term would have expired). But it would also allow the Governor to appoint an interim replacement to serve through January's election, and crucially would protect against party-flipping from requiring the appointee to be of the same party as the Senator who caused the vacancy.
Now, this legislation isn't perfect. While it's okay for now to provide a Democratic Governor with free rein to select a Democrat to fill a Democratic vacancy, it's another to allow the ideological mishegoss which might ensure by giving a Republican Governor full latitude to fill such a vacancy, however temporarily, by locating a conservative who just happened to be registered as a Democrat at the time. (Or vice versa.) Three of the four states with same-party requirements also require the Governor to select the appointee from a list drawn by the party's state commitee, a process which worked fine in Wyoming in 2007, and I still think Massachusetts will be well-served by including such a requirement now, even if it might delay the appointment being finalized by a few weeks.
[Names currently being bandied about, according to reports, include former Gov. Michael Dukakis, former DNC Chairman Paul Kirk Jr., former Massachusetts Senate President Robert Travaglini and former Kennedy staff chief Nick Littlefield.]
Still, an imperfect solution is far better than a vacancy, and this legislation is fine for right now. With the State House expected to vote on it today, please sign the WeNeedTwo petition to urge the Massachusetts legislature to vote for this proposal, and if you are a Bay Stater, call your representatives on Beacon Hill and urge them to act.
updated, 5:06 PM EDT: I ought to change the title of this post. By a 90-68 vote within the last hour, the Massachusetts State House now has removed the "same party" requirement from the pending bill. AP:
The bill initially would have required the appointee be from the same party as the person who created the vacancy, a Democrat in the case of Kennedy's successor.
That requirement was stripped during debate after critics raised constitutional concerns and noted that more than half of voters in Massachusetts are unenrolled in any party and would be barred from consideration.
They don't listen.