§ 66.002.Initiation of Suit

How the action begins, and the procedure explains why it is rare.

The attorney general or the county or district attorney of the proper county may petition the district court of the proper county — or a district judge if the court is in vacation — for leave to file an information in the nature of quo warranto.

Only a public prosecutor may bring it. A private citizen cannot file a quo warranto action, however clear the usurpation.

That restriction is the defining feature of the remedy. Challenging a person’s right to hold public office is a matter for the state, and allowing private suits would turn every contested appointment into litigation.

The petition must state that the information is sought in the name of the State of Texas.

Leave is required before filing. This is a two-step procedure — a petition for leave, then the information itself — which is unusual and deliberate.

The judge shall grant leave if there is probable ground for the proceeding, and shall then order the information to be filed and process to be issued.

"Probable ground" is a screening standard, not a merits determination. Once it is met the judge has no discretion — "shall grant leave" — so the gate is about substance rather than about whether the case is worth bringing.

Subsection (c) preserves the private citizen’s indirect route. The prosecutor may file on his own motion or at the request of an individual relator.

The relator is the person with the real grievance — the candidate who should have the office, the shareholder objecting to a corporate act — and the costs provision awards costs in the relator’s favour.