The secretary of state of Kansas is one of the constitutional officers of the U.S. state of

Kansas Kansas () is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its Capital city, capital is Topeka, Kansas, Topeka, and its largest city is Wichita, Kansas, Wichita. Kansas is a landlocked state bordered by Nebras ...

. The current secretary of state is the former speaker ''pro tempore'' of the

Kansas House of Representatives The Kansas House of Representatives is the lower house of the legislature of the U.S. state of Kansas. Composed of 125 state representatives from districts with roughly equal populations of at least 19,000, its members are responsible for craft ...

, Scott Schwab, who was sworn in on January 14, 2019.

History

The first secretary of state for Kansas was John Winter Robinson, a physician originally from Litchfield, Maine, but who had settled in

Manhattan, Kansas Manhattan is a city and county seat of Riley County, Kansas, United States, although the city extends into Pottawatomie County. It is located in northeastern Kansas at the junction of the Kansas River and Big Blue River. As of the 2020 c ...

, in 1857. Robinson was elected in December 1859, in anticipation of

statehood A state is a centralized political organization that imposes and enforces rules over a population within a territory. There is no undisputed definition of a state. One widely used definition comes from the German sociologist Max Weber: a "st ...

for Kansas, and sworn in after Kansas was admitted to the Union in February 1861. As a result of a

bond Bond or bonds may refer to: Common meanings * Bond (finance), a type of debt security * Bail bond, a commercial third-party guarantor of surety bonds in the United States * Chemical bond, the attraction of atoms, ions or molecules to form chemical ...

scandal, Robinson was

impeached Impeachment is the process by which a legislative body or other legally constituted tribunal initiates charges against a public official for misconduct. It may be understood as a unique process involving both political and legal elements. In ...

on February 26, 1862, along with the governor,

Charles L. Robinson Charles Lawrence Robinson (July 21, 1818 – August 17, 1894) was an American politician who served in the California State Assembly from 1851-52, and later as the first Governor of Kansas from 1861 until 1863. He was also the first governor of ...

, and state auditor, George S. Hillyer. Robinson was convicted by the

Kansas Senate The Kansas Senate is the upper house of the Kansas Legislature, the state legislature of the U.S. State of Kansas. It is composed of 40 senators elected from single-member districts, each with a population of at least 60,000 inhabitants. Members ...

on June 12, 1862, and removed from his office, becoming the first state

executive branch The Executive, also referred as the Executive branch or Executive power, is the term commonly used to describe that part of government which enforces the law, and has overall responsibility for the governance of a state. In political systems ...

official to be impeached and removed from office in U.S. history. Hillyer was also removed from office, on June 16, but Governor Robinson was acquitted. Sanders R. Shepard succeeded to the job of secretary of state on July 28, 1862. In 2015, Secretary Kris Kobach requested and was granted by the Kansas Legislature prosecutorial power in voter fraud cases. In October that year, he filed his first three-vote fraud cases dealing with voting in two states.

Duties

Electoral

The secretary of state is the chief

election An election is a formal group decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual or multiple individuals to hold public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy has operat ...

s officer of the state, administering elections and

voter registration In electoral systems, voter registration (or enrollment) is the requirement that a person otherwise eligible to vote must register (or enroll) on an electoral roll, which is usually a prerequisite for being entitled or permitted to vote. The r ...

throughout the state. The office also receives

campaign finance Campaign finance, also known as election finance or political donations, refers to the funds raised to promote candidates, political parties, or policy initiatives and referendums. Political parties, charitable organizations, and political a ...

reports and registers

lobbyists In politics, lobbying, persuasion or interest representation is the act of lawfully attempting to influence the actions, policies, or decisions of government officials, most often legislators or members of regulatory agencies. Lobbying, whi ...

. The duty of regulating lobbying and campaign finance is shared with the Kansas Governmental Ethics Commission. The secretary was granted by the Kansas Legislature prosecutorial power in voter fraud cases and is the first and only secretary of state to hold that power.

Economic

The secretary operates the Business Filing Center, which registers business entities,

trademark A trademark (also written trade mark or trade-mark) is a type of intellectual property consisting of a recognizable sign, design, or expression that identifies products or services from a particular source and distinguishes them from othe ...

trade name A trade name, trading name, or business name, is a pseudonym used by companies that do not operate under their registered company name. The term for this type of alternative name is a "fictitious" business name. Registering the fictitious name w ...

s and

lien A lien ( or ) is a form of security interest granted over an item of property to secure the payment of a debt or performance of some other obligation. The owner of the property, who grants the lien, is referred to as the ''lienee'' and the per ...

s made pursuant to the

Uniform Commercial Code The Uniform Commercial Code (UCC), first published in 1952, is one of a number of Uniform Acts that have been established as law with the goal of harmonizing the laws of sales and other commercial transactions across the United States through U ...

. The secretary regulates a wide variety of businesses, including sports agents,

trade union A trade union (labor union in American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers intent on "maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment", ch. I such as attaining better wages and benefits ...

s, cemeteries and

funeral home A funeral home, funeral parlor or mortuary, is a business that provides burial and funeral services for the dead and their families. These services may include a prepared wake and funeral, and the provision of a chapel for the funeral. Services ...

Administrative

The Secretary's Publications Section is responsible for publishing various legal and informational documents for the state including

statutory A statute is a formal written enactment of a legislative authority that governs the legal entities of a city, state, or country by way of consent. Typically, statutes command or prohibit something, or declare policy. Statutes are rules made by le ...

and

administrative law Administrative law is the division of law that governs the activities of executive branch agencies of government. Administrative law concerns executive branch rule making (executive branch rules are generally referred to as "regulations"), ad ...

publications such as session laws,

regulation Regulation is the management of complex systems according to a set of rules and trends. In systems theory, these types of rules exist in various fields of biology and society, but the term has slightly different meanings according to context. Fo ...

s and the state's

gazette A gazette is an official journal, a newspaper of record, or simply a newspaper. In English and French speaking countries, newspaper publishers have applied the name ''Gazette'' since the 17th century; today, numerous weekly and daily newspaper ...

, the ''Kansas Register''. The secretary also operates "Safe at Home", the state's Address Confidentiality Program and conducts census adjustments.

Officeholders

Territorial

State

References

External links

* {{U.S. State Secretaries of State Secretaries of State of Kansas 1861 establishments in Kansas