To respond to Vox: The election was held by members of the Universal Church calling for the Universal Church to elect, the chapels from Radko Janskey's listings of trad chapels (equivalent to today's traditio.com) were contacted. Only sedevacantists could be considered members of the Church, there weren't many such chapels, and I don't know how else before the internet in 1990 that a practical unanimity of sedes could be contacted. Also, during all previous vacancies of the Holy See, there was a focus on electing; hence sedes who rejected necessary election efforts and carry on an artificial "sedevacantism" would be schismatic for doing so. Many sedes are not purely sedevacantist-looking-for-an-election, but are sedeprivationists or think that is an option (where the theory may be heretical, and is definitely schismatic as it rejects a conclavist election and/or a hyopthetical miraculous election, but rather believes that the elections of the Catholic Church are in the hands of heretics). So regarding convalidation, one may argue that among all who correctly were sedevacantist and seeking an election, they accepted PM as pope and hence he was pope.
To Pacelli: The second objection is easier, convalidation is different from acclamation. Even the sedeplenists like Bp. Williamson have written arguing that Francis was "convalidated" as pope by being accepted by a practical unanimity of conciliarists. Also, Catholics did not consider the election of Benedict IX as "outrageous and madness", as it produced a true pope. If you look at the history of popes and antipopes, elections have been messy at times. Obviously as conclavists we're more concerned with being without a leader, as the Church has a pope as its head, so since the Church is visible and one, it is capable of electing a pope and so Catholics proceeded to elect pope Michael in 1990. You may recall that during the longest prior vacancy before after 1958, which lasted 3 years, Catholics rioted and locked cardinals into a room and made them fast to push them to elect a pope. Hence, some of the sedevacantist opposition to electing/accpeting/being under a pope, while often correctly out of a spirit of caution, seems also to be contrary to this spirit of electing a pope as immediately as possible. Also generally I have not seen much sedevacantist writing on why sedes aren't conclavists, often when I've had discussions with sedes, there seems to be a lack of ability to explain why they are sede. This is not presuming conclavism is correct in itself; this discussion is fresh and I don't think has had enough people praying, studying, and discussing it, hence God will judge justly on if people are in material schism or formal schism for being sede or following an antipope, etc.
To the first objection, I do not believe the quote has been interpreted incorrectly. Typically I source quotes so people can research them for themselves; I did not do this here, however the secondary source is a sede "bishop" (I think he has invalid "Old Catholic" orders) who was writing on the possibility of elections, and the quote source link can be found in a search engine with little effort:
bishopjosephmarie.org/doctrine/papalclaimants.htmlAnd in the truly extraordinary case where the above is not possible, the right to elect falls upon the whole Church.
“In case of doubt, however (e.g. when it is unknown if someone be a true cardinal or when the pope is dead or uncertain, as seems to have happened at the time of the Great Schism which began under Urban VI), it is to be affirmed that the power to apply the papacy to a person (the due requirements having been complied with) resides in the Church of God. And then by way of devolution it is seen that this power descends to the universal Church, since the electors determined by the pope do not exist.” (Cajetan, Tract.1 de auctoritate Papae et Concilii, c.13).
“[W]hen the provisions of the Canon Law cannot be fulfilled, the right to elect will belong to certain members of the Church of Rome. In default of the Roman clergy the right will belong to the Church universal...” (Church of the Word Incarnate, 1955, Journet, citing Rene Grousset, Histoire des croisades et du royaume franc De Jerusalem, Paris, 1934-1936)
Journet's Church of the Word Incarnate online states:
www.ewtn.com/library/THEOLOGY/chwordin3.htm#10In a case where the settled conditions of validity have become inapplicable, the task of determining new ones falls to the Church by devolution, this last word being taken, as Cajetan notes (Apologia, cap. xiii, no. 745) not in the strict sense (devolution is strictly to the higher authority in case of default in the lower) but in the wide sense, signifying all transmission even to an inferior.
It was in the course of the disputes on the respective authorities of Pope and Council that the question of the power to elect a Pope came up in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. On this point Cajetan's thought is as follows.
He explains first that the power to elect the Pope resides in his predecessors eminently, regularly and principally. Eminently, as the "forms" of lower beings are in the angels, who, however, are incapable in themselves of exercising the activities of bodies (Apologia, cap. xiii, no. 736). Regularly, that is to say as an ordinary right, unlike the Church in her widowhood, unable to determine a new mode of election save "in casu", unless forced by sheer necessity. Principally, unlike the widowed Church, in whom this power resides only secondarily (no. 737). During a vacancy of the Apostolic See, neither the Church nor the Council can contravene the provisions already laid down to determine the valid mode of election (De Comparata, cap. xiii, no. 202). However, in case of permission (for example if the Pope has provided nothing against it), or in case of ambiguity (for example, if it is unknown who the true Cardinals are or who the true Pope is, as was the case at the time of the Great Schism), the power "of applying the Papacy to such and such a person" devolves on the universal Church, the Church of God (ibid., no. 204).
Since many of the sede orders are technically non-Catholic, mostly stemming from Lefebvre and Thuc (who incurred automatic excommunication upon celebrating the novus ordo missal, among other things), and because there were no known clergymen who had not defected to the conciliar schism and incurred penalties, mostly laymen were left over to elect a pope, or pope Michael reasoned that more or less clergy would participate in such an election as laymen (and then the pope elected would decide on removing their penalties which are reserved to the Holy See, etc.). The cardinals/clergy were responsible for preventing the conciliar schism and/or producing a papal election in a timely fashion, which was not done, hence this necessitated an election by the universal Church, that is, mostly laymen.
Lastly, I believe there is a quote which says something like that laymen participating in papal elections was an exception, not a rule; and obviously we state these are exceptional times and since laymen participated in elections before, they were able to do so now.
Another thread of interest by conciliarists asked what would happen if all cardinals were not of voting age or died:
www.phatmass.com/phorum/topic/132701-what-if-there-are-no-cardinals-of-voting-age-when-a-pope-dies/"As I'm no expert in canon law, this is just a guess, but I think the canon law would be circumvented by the fact that there is no obligation where there is no means of keeping the obligation, i.e., if there are no cardinals, there is no way to have a licit conclave, so the conclave falls by the wayside and the election follows some different, more ancient tradition. There would probably be anti-popes and schisms following, with no clear indication of who was the real pope. As I recall, even some saints were confused during the Great Western Schism. St. Bernard wrote a letter praising the Pisan anti-pope."
The confusion came about after 1958 when according to the sede view (which I believe is correct), no pope was elected in 1958. Here the cardinals should have assembled to elect a pope in an "alternative" election, which one sedevacantist priest (Fr. Saenz y Arriaga) tried to arrange for and maybe others, but it did not happen; even excommunicated cardinals can vote, though they had to elect a Catholic. Although with argument #2 I offered, if some kind of election like pope Michael's had happened then like in 1959, even though technically the electors were clearly known to be the cardinals, the election could have been "convalidated" by being accepted by sedevacantists then and there. Or if Bp. Thuc had been elected pope then and was convalidated he could have become pope.
One last point is that you may be familiar with the document "Cum Ex Apostolatus Officio", which accurately describes the picture of what happened post-1958 in our view (cardinals unanimously accepted a schismatic election, although with other clergy). The document does not detail how to hold an election in such a circumstance (even though it envisioned that all the cardinals could defect, indeed it spoke explicitly of such a possibility). This seems odd, hence it seems it must have been presuming the principle of devolution or was not worried about the Church being able to elect. You may note Journet also does not state how such an election is to be held, though in the quote I offered he says, "In a case where the settled conditions of validity have become inapplicable, the task of determining new ones falls to the Church by devolution ... Regularly, that is to say as an ordinary right, unlike the Church in her widowhood, unable to determine a new mode of election save "in casu", unless forced by sheer necessity. ... However, in case of permission (for example if the Pope has provided nothing against it), or in case of ambiguity (for example, if it is unknown who the true Cardinals are or who the true Pope is, as was the case at the time of the Great Schism), the power "of applying the Papacy to such and such a person" devolves on the universal Church, the Church of God (ibid., no. 204)."
Hence the election of pope Michael was done of "sheer necessity" since the normal ecclesiastical law of election by cardinals could not be fulfilled, nor did the bishops elect in a general imperfect council nor did the clergy of Rome elect. We therefore conclude that of necessity pope Michael is pope.
I welcome any discussion and/or insights you may have, I only ask for charity! I certainly believe that if the conciliar church is not Catholic (which I believe is true), then the separate Catholic Church needs its own pope. The conciliar Crisis was not simply about the heresies of Vatican 2, but was principally of a schism being created by an invalid election. Hence the remedy is to elect a ["conclavist"] pope and restore order to the Church, and I believe a deliberately continued/artificial sedevacantism is not necessary, desirable, or correct to do, although I understand there may be difficulties to work through to straighten things out.
P.S. From what was posted by Pacelli in the Library:
tradcath.proboards.com/thread/233/papal-elections-journet-1955Section #5 I might enjoy discussing and have seen before. We have observed that the election of Pope Michael was peacefully accepted by silence and therefore consent, as no substantial objection was raised about why there should be no necessary election of a pope. Some sedes who were interested in conclavism at the time of PM's election, advocated for delaying ... and some 25 years later, still sedevacantists advocate for delay. However, the question then becomes when a pope could ever be elected, as how will we wait for a more opportune time? Some have stated that the Church is too divided to elect a pope ... however this borders on heresy, as the Church is One and is Visible, therefore since sedes would be part of one Church working in harmony, hence they could produce a pope of those visible members. Also, there is a question of how the Church could become more ordered for wouldn't prolonged popelessness foster division? Dr. Johas also in "Is a Pope Necessary?" even goes so far as to suggest that those who "do not hesitate to affirm the perrennial popelessness" of the Church are heretics.
In any event, I hope that God's Church may be organized and orderly and that He may bring about true unity and to remove confusion and error!