The South Carolina Supreme Court voted Tuesday to require the State Election Commission and all counties to hold the 2012 Primary despite county contentions that the election lacked a mandate.

The Court voted 3-2 in favor of the South Carolina Republican Party and the Election Commission, and as a result, counties must provide voting equipment, locations and staffing for the Jan. 21 primary.

The court heard arguments on Nov. 14 after four South Carolina counties — Beaufort, Chester, Greenville and Spartanburg — filed suit to block the primary.

The main controversies in the case arose over whether a statute enacted for the 2008 primary carried over to 2012 and whether budget provisos that authorized the state election commission to fund the primary actually required it to do so.

Greenville County Director of Voter Registration and Elections Conway Belangia said he hasn't had a chance to read the official decision, as he is staffing his office for a runoff election, but had heard about the 3-2 vote.

"We’ll abide by the results of the court," Belangia said. "There is always the potential for a one-time hearing."

Belangia said Greenville is equipped to run an election as well as anyone, whether it's a lead role or as a partner with the state GOP.

"Our only issue was making sure our costs were covered," he said. Belangia said he expects to talk with the county's legal team on Wednesday to discuss what action, if any, will be taken.

"We will digest the decision and see where we go from here," Belangia said. "We never said we wouldn't do the primary, we just wanted to be sure the county's interests were properly protected."

Belangia said that the county has never incurred an "unusual expense," but said that he hopes that the necessary people have heard the counties concerns and are taking notice to help bring clarity to the situation.

Henry Laye, director of voter registration and elections in Spartanburg County, said that he would leave the matter to the legal team to determine if more should be done.

"That is the decision of the state Supreme Court," Laye said. "So that settles it."

Laye said Spartanburg County now would begin preparing the voting machines and getting ready for the Jan. 21 primary.

In the Court's majority opinion, Chief Justice Jean Toal wrote that the statute requiring counties to conduct the 2008 primary represented a permanent law, despite a clause in it that specified its applicability for the 2008 election cycle.

"This Court has held that a statute shall not be construed by concentrating on an isolated phrase," Toal wrote, citing precedent.

However, Toal conceded that without the budget provisos enacted by the General Assembly during 2011, the "temporal limitation" would have been respected.

"We hold the provisos of the 2011-2012 Appropriations Act allowing the State Election Commission to use funds toward a Presidential Preference Primary suspend the temporal limitation of [the 2007 statute] and authorize the State Election Commission and the County Election Commissions to conduct a Presidential Preferential Primary in 2012," Toal wrote.

"Accordingly, only the language limiting that section to the 2008 election cycle must be stricken as that is the only provision of the statute in conflict with the current budget provisos."

Toal wrote that if the Court found otherwise, it would produce an irrational result.

"If they were not so construed, the provisos would authorize the State Election Commission to carry over certain funds to perform an unauthorized act, which would be an absurd result," Toal wrote.

The decision will allow the 2012 primary to be held in the same manner as it was held during 2008, using county resources and taxpayer funds, rather than being funded solely by the Republican Party.

While the Republican Party had hoped to include advisory questions on the ballot in addition to the Republican Presidential candidates, the Court ruled that such questions were not mandated by the statute and thus could not be included.

"Additionally, no other advisory elections, straw polls, or the like on any question may be conducted at the various Presidential Preference Primary polling places or within 200 feet of the entrance to such polling places," Toal wrote.

Justices Costa Pleicones and John Kittredge concurred with the majority opinion, while Justices Donald Beatty and Kaye Hearn dissented.

In her dissenting opinion, Justice Hearn said that the Court had overreached.

Hearn said that because presidential primaries were not, "unquestionably core functions of our State government," they were excepted from general statutes requiring state and county election commissions to conduct elections.

Additionally, Hearn said that budget provisos like those passed during the 2007 General Assembly could only override existing law if there was an irreconcilable conflict between the two.

But, in this case, Hearn said, the language in the budget provisios only allowed the state Election Commission to fund the 2012 primary and did not require it. As such, she said, the statute that limited state election commission funding and support to the 2008 election cycle only did not irreconcilably conflict with the 2011 budget provisos.

"Thus, the responsibility for conducting the 2012 Presidential Preference Primary falls on the political parties, only to be supplemented by the State Commission in its discretion," Hearn wrote. 

"Moreover, there is nothing in the provisos which would require the county commissions, or the State Commission for that matter, to shoulder the economic burden of a presidential preference primary."

Hearn also noted that the General Assembly failed to pass proposed bills that would have stricken the 2008 limitation from the statute.

"In rejecting these proposals, the General Assembly manifested its intent that mandatory involvement on the part of the State and county commissions was limited to 2008," Hearn wrote.

The decision will allow the 2012 primary to be held in the same manner as it was held during 2008, using county resources and taxpayer funds, rather than being funded solely by the Republican Party.