On May 28, S8007 was introduced in the New York State Senate. It liberalizes the definition of a qualified political party. The existing definition says a qualified party is a group that polled at least 50,000 votes for Governor. The bill changes this, so that it is a group that polled at least 50,000 votes for any statewide office in a gubernatorial election year. If this bill were law now, the Green Party would be ballot-qualified, because in 2006 it polled 117,908 votes for Comptroller, and 61,849 votes for Attorney General, and 55,469 votes for U.S. Senate. Governor is the only race in which the Green Party didn’t receive 50,000 votes.
On June 1, the bill was transferred from the Election Committee to the Rules Committee. According to an employee of the New York legislature, this is a good sign for the bill, because “Rules is a stronger committee than Elections.” The bill’s author is the Rules Committee itself, so the bill is likely to pass the Rules Committee. Thanks to William D. Stevenson for this news.
This is great news for New Yorkers… if it passes. Please contact your State Senators and tell them to support this bill!
New York State Senate
Switchboard: (518) 455-2800
excellent news!
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This would be good news if it passes, but I doubt it will pass. Most politicians want fewer parties, not more, especially with fusion in NY. It makes more work and more promises for them to get their name on the ballot multiple times
This makes a whole lot more sense.
Richard:
If this bill should make it all the way to Governor Patterson’s desk and he signs it, what would be the cut-off date for it to apply to this year’s election instead of 2014?
The bill says “This Act shall take effect immediately.” So if it passed soon, it seems to me the Green Party would be considered ballot-qualified this year.
The Libertarian Party would not be covered, because the highest vote total for a Libertarian in 2006 was 40,472 votes for Comptroller.
I webformed the following to my legislators at:
Gov.
http://www.state.ny.us/governor/contact/GovernorContactForm.php
Assembly
http://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/?ad=011&sh=contact
substitute your assembly district for “ad=011″, or use the search tool at:
http://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/
Senate
http://www.nysenate.gov/nyss_senator_search/
re: support S8007
Please support S8007, the proposed bill to make it easier for a party to achieve ballot access.
There is now a proposal which would grant permanent ballot status to a party that garners 50,000 votes in any statewide race. Current law requires a party to obtain at least 50,000 votes only in a governor’s race to keep its ballot line.
There is no fair reason why voters must register effective support for a party’s ballot status only by voting for its governor candidate.
The unfair reason for the 50,000-only-for-governor requirement is to impose yet another barrier to new groups who would compete with existing party establishments.
The requirement forces the existing minor parties to rubber-stamp a governor candidate of the Republicans or Democrats, to keep ballot status.
The requirement allowed the treacherous Andrew Cuomo to destroy the Liberal Party.
The requirement has excluded the Green Party and the Libertarian Party from ballot status several times.
The present rule is unfair and undemocratic. Please change it.
There is some thought that minor parties can hurt a cause by splitting its vote, but
this would best be fixed by approval voting, or instant-runoff-voting, or any of the voting systems that allow voters to vote for all the candidates they approve of. The current vote-for-only-one-candidate system has the evil advantage of allowing an establishment to divide and conquer its opposition. It has also provided a spurious excuse for most unfair ballot access laws.