A new party in Oregon, called the Independent Party, turned in approximately 26,000 signatures on December 6, 2006. The state will know if the party has enough valid signatures by January 20, 2007 or so. The Independent Party seems to be either centrist or somewhat “progressive” and wants to stiffen Oregon campaign finance laws. It also wants to make it easier for independent candidates to get on the ballot. Because the 2005 session of the Oregon legislature made it much more difficult for independent candidates to get on the ballot, the existence of the Independent Party offers a second vehicle for such potential candidates in the future. Also, the 2005 session of the legislature passed HB 2167, which says that in the future, independent candidates are to be labeled “Non-affiliated Voter” on the November ballot, not “independent candidate”. So, there was no problem with the Oregon Independent Party’s name being rejected as too similar to the term “independent candidate”.
You say “the 2005 session of the Oregon legislature made it much more difficult for independent candidates to get on the ballot”,
what can you tell us about their motivation?
To: State Secretary
Fr: Your counterpart in Delaware
Independent Party (Oregon)
Great News !
Best Wishes for 2007 and beyond.
I’m looking forward to reading your platform.
Wolfgang von Baumgart,
State Secretary
Independent Party of Delaware
wbaumgart@netzero.com
check out our platform at WWWIndependentpartyofde.org
The website of the Independent Party of Oregon is http://www.indparty.com. There you will find the beginnings of a platform.
What was the motivation of the major party legislators who overwhelmingly made it far more difficult for independent candidates in Oregon to qualify for the ballot. Their apparent motivation is to avoid having any pesky independent candidate raising issues that neither major party in Oregon has ever dealt with, like limits on campaign contributions (Oregon has no limits).