The plaintiff, Carl E. Ring, filed his complaint, setting up all necessary jurisdictional allegations as to his right to qualify as a candidate for representative in Congress from the Ninth Congressional District of New Jersey, and asserting that he had prepared and attempted to have filed on May 22, 1948 with the defendant, the Honorable Lloyd B. Marsh, Secretary of State of the State New Jersey, a ‘direct nominating‘
petition requesting that his name and his designation of party or principle as a candidate for representative be printed on the ballot to be used at the general election to be held in New Jersey on November 2, 1948. See Revised Statutes of New Jersey,
Secs. 19:13-3 to 9, N.J.S.A. The complaint alleges also that the defendant by his agents refused to accept the petition for filing on the ground that the time for filing such petitions had expired on March 11, 1948 under the law of New Jersey, specifically pursuant to
R.S. Sec. 19:13-9, as amended by Chapter 2 of the Laws of 1948,
N.J.S.A. 19:13-9. See New Jersey Session Law Service 1948, No. 1, 172nd Legislature, at p. 64. The amendment fixed the final day for filing nominating petitions for the general election as forty days prior to the primary day.
The statute last cited must be read in conjunction with
R.S. Sec. 19:2-1,
as amended also by Chapter 2 of the Laws of 1948, N.S.J.A. 19:2-1, which provides that primary elections for delegates and alternates to the national conventions and for the general election shall be held on the third Tuesday in April in each year. If the statutes as amended be valid and constitutional it would follow that Ring's petition should have been proffered to the Secretary of State no later than forty days prior to April 20, 1948, or, on or before March 11, 1948