The Alabama Supreme Court ruled Thursday in favor of the Steve Flowers’ senatorial campaign, Flowers on the ballot and in the race.

The 9-member court voted 5-3 in favor of Flowers in the appeal filed by the Secretary of State and the State of Alabama. The appeal was filed Tuesday after Montgomery Circuit Court Judge Charles Price ruled to keep Flowers on the ballot.

The ruling Thursday prevents the Republican Party from removing Flowers from the ballot after they had elected to disqualify him on April 15.

The Supreme Court upheld Price’s ruling that the Republican Party had missed the deadline for removing Flowers’ name. The deadline for removing names is 55 days prior to the election.

&uot;We are ecstatic with the court’s ruling,&uot; Flowers said. &uot;The people of District 14 will be allowed to select their next senator in a democratic fashion. They will not have the choice made for them by some back-room meeting in some hotel.&uot;

Flowers was referring to the April 15 meeting by the GOP candidate committee that ruled Flowers had not provided adequate evidence he had lived in District 14 for at least one year.

Following the ruling, Flowers was able to get a temporary restraining order on the release of state ballots last Friday. On Monday, attorneys for Flowers and the state presented arguments to Price who issued his findings on Tuesday.

The state appealed to the Supreme Court, which called a special hearing for Wednesday.

April 25 is the deadline for ballots to be printed and prepared so absentee ballots may be mailed out.

&uot;The quick response by the Supreme Court just proves how solid Judge Prices’ ruling was,&uot; Flowers said. &uot;The only thing I ever wanted out of this legal battle was to give the people of the district the chance to select their next senator. They haven’t had one if eight years and I wanted to make sure they had a chance to decide by their vote.&uot;

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