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      CHICAGO (AP) -  Illinois' highest court agreed Tuesday to take
Rahm Emanuel's appeal of a decision that threw him off the ballot
for Chicago mayor and ordered election officials not to print any
mayoral ballots without Emanuel's name.


      State Supreme Court justices agreed to expedite the case, but
they gave no specific time frame. They planned to review legal
briefs only and would not hold oral arguments.
   


   Emanuel has asked the court to overturn a lower ruling that
pulled his name off the ballot because he had not lived in the city
for a year. His attorneys called Monday's decision "squarely
inconsistent" with previous rulings on the issue.
     


 The moves by the high court bought valuable time for Emanuel.
The Chicago Board of Elections had said it would begin printing
ballots without his name as early as Tuesday, with the election
less than a month away. Absentee ballots were to be sent out within
days.
      

Messages left for election officials were not immediately
returned.
     


 "I'm confident in the argument we're making about the fact that
I never lost my residency," Emanuel said Tuesday at a campaign
stop where he picked up an endorsement from the Teamsters Joint
Council.
    

  Emanuel said the order on the ballot printing was "an important
first step in ensuring that voters are not disenfranchised and that
they ultimately get to choose the next Mayor of Chicago."
     

 In their appeal, Emanuel's attorneys called Monday's ruling
"one of the most far-reaching election law rulings" ever issued
in Illinois, not only because of its effect on the mayoral race but
for "the unprecedented restriction" it puts on future candidates.
      


His lawyers raise several points, including that the appeals
court applied a stricter definition of "residency" than the one
used for voters. They say Illinois courts have never required
candidates to be physically present in the state to seek office
there.
   


   By adopting this new requirement, the court rejected state law
allowing people to keep their residence in Illinois even if they
are away doing work for the state or federal government, the appeal
said.
    


  Emanuel, a former congressman who represented Chicago, was gone
while he served as President Barack Obama's chief of staff for
nearly two years.
     


 The new standard also sets a "significant limitation on ballot
access" that denies voters the right to choose certain candidates,
the appeal said.
     


 Just hours after Monday's ruling, the campaign to replace
retiring Mayor Richard M. Daley began to look like an actual race.
      


For months, three of the main candidates struggled for attention
while Emanuel outpolled and outraised them, blanketed the airwaves
with television ads and gained the endorsement of former President
Bill Clinton, who came to town to campaign for Emanuel.

      Former Sen. Carol Moseley Braun, city Clerk Miguel del Valle and
former Chicago schools chief Gery Chico suddenly found themselves
in the spotlight - and trying to win over Emanuel supporters who
suddenly may be up for grabs.
      


Even as Emanuel vowed to fight the decision, Braun urged voters
to join her campaign "with your time, your effort or your money."
     

 Reporters surrounding Chico outside a restaurant asked him if he
was a front-runner - something that seemed inconceivable last week
when a Chicago Tribune/WGN poll showed him with the support of just
16 percent of voters surveyed compared with a whopping 44 percent
for Emanuel. The same poll showed Braun with 21 percent support,
and del Valle with 7 percent.
    


  "I'm trying to get every vote I can from everybody in this
city," said Chico, who released records last week showing he had
just over $2 million at his disposal, about one-fourth of the money
available to Emanuel.
     


 In their 2-1 ruling Monday, an appeals court said Emanuel met
the requirements to vote in Chicago but not to run for mayor
because he had been living in Washington.
   

   Challengers to Emanuel's candidacy argued the Democrat did not
qualify because he rented out his Chicago home and moved his family
to Washington to work for President Barack Obama for nearly two
years. Emanuel - who quit his job and moved back to Chicago in
October after Daley announced he would not to seek a seventh term -
has said he always intended to return to Chicago and was living in
Washington at the president's request.
   


   If he doesn't win the appeal, the race takes on a whole new
dynamic. In a city with huge blocs of black, white and Hispanic
voters, the Chicago Tribune/WGN poll showed Emanuel leading among
all of them, even though his three top rivals are minorities.
     


 Laura Washington, a local political commentator who writes a
column for the Chicago Sun-Times, said if Emanuel is out, Chico,
who is Hispanic, could be the big winner in terms of fundraising.
      


"Rahm has the establishment support, the civic leaders,
business community, the money class. And Chico is as close to that
type of candidate as anyone," Washington said. "They'd take Chico
as a second choice, easily."
      


Braun would be the big winner among black voters, she said. The
recent poll showed Emanuel with the support of 40 percent of black
voters compared with 39 percent for Braun, even though two other
prominent black candidates dropped out of the race to try to unify
the black vote.
   


   Del Valle, another Hispanic candidate, said Emanuel's quandary
bodes well for the other candidates, regardless of what the court
does.
     


 "Now voters see there's an opportunity to look at the field and
give candidates either a second look or in some cases a first
look," del Valle said. "People are going to pay more attention to
the other candidates."

      Associated Press writers Don Babwin, Sophia
Tareen and Michael Tarm contributed to this report.

Gallery

Ill. court throws Emanuel off Chicago ballot

Politics and Government News

The Illinois Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered
election officials not to print any mayoral ballots without Rahm
Emanuel's name while the justices consider whether to hear an
appeal from the former White House chief of staff.

Illinois high court will hear Rahm Emanuel appeal

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