---
type: "Bill"
title: "Bleckley County; Magistrate Court chief judge; provide nonpartisan elections"
description: "A BILL to be entitled an Act to provide that future elections for the office of chief judge of the Magistrate Court of Bleckley County shall be nonpartisan elections; to provide for the sitting chief judge of the magistrate court to serve out his or her term of office; to provide for related matters; to repeal conflicting laws; and for other purposes."
jurisdiction: "us/states/ga"
legislature: "Georgia General Assembly"
session: "2021_22"
identifier: "HB 704"
citation: "Georgia HB 704 (2021_22)"
classification: ["bill"]
subjects: []
status: "enacted"
primary_sponsors: ["Danny Mathis"]
version_count: 3
action_count: 13
vote_count: 1
first_action: "2021-03-03"
last_action: "2021-05-03"
source: "openstates"
source_identifier: "ocd-bill/143d7cb6-fe24-4acc-9a4a-2f0e7a3b975a"
source_url: "http://webservices.legis.ga.gov/GGAServices/Legislation/Service.svc?wsdl"
source_hash: "1d56c9437b3ca197b9d445b44b22391110cb4edbcc25d76ee1b717a5813c8eb9"
vintage: "2026-07-01"
source_snapshot: "https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump"
retrieved_at: "2026-07-06"
confidence: "reported"
tags: ["legislation", "bill", "us-ga"]
---

# Georgia HB 704 (2021_22) — Bleckley County; Magistrate Court chief judge; provide nonpartisan elections

A BILL to be entitled an Act to provide that future elections for the office of chief judge of the Magistrate Court of Bleckley County shall be nonpartisan elections; to provide for the sitting chief judge of the magistrate court to serve out his or her term of office; to provide for related matters; to repeal conflicting laws; and for other purposes.

## Version chain

The bill's text revisions, in order — the diff chain from filing to enrollment.

1. **HB 704/AP*** (committee substitute) — [source](http://www.legis.ga.gov/Legislation/20212022/201677.pdf)
2. **LC 47 0770/a** (committee substitute) — [source](http://www.legis.ga.gov/Legislation/20212022/199401.pdf)
3. **Local Ad** (committee substitute) — [source](http://www.legis.ga.gov/Legislation/20212022/199418.pdf)

## Votes

- PASSAGE — **103–68** (pass) · lower

## Sponsors

- Danny Mathis — primary (person)

## Timeline

The legislative action history — every referral, reading, and vote.

- **2021-03-03** House Hopper
- **2021-03-05** House First Readers `reading-1`
- **2021-03-08** House Second Readers `reading-2`
- **2021-03-11** House Committee Favorably Reported `committee-passage-favorable`
- **2021-03-17** House Third Readers `reading-3`
- **2021-03-17** House Passed/Adopted `passage`
- **2021-03-18** Senate Read and Referred `referral-committee`
- **2021-03-25** Senate Committee Favorably Reported `committee-passage-favorable`
- **2021-03-25** Senate Passed/Adopted `passage`
- **2021-04-05** House Sent to Governor `executive-receipt`
- **2021-05-03** House Date Signed by Governor `executive-signature`
- **2021-05-03** Act 104 `executive-signature`
- **2021-05-03** Effective Date

## Source

OpenStates / OpenCivicData bulk snapshot [2026-07-01](https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump); origin `ocd-bill/143d7cb6-fe24-4acc-9a4a-2f0e7a3b975a`. Confidence: reported (aggregated from official Georgia legislature records).