The Arkansas House Committee on State Agencies and Governmental Affairs will hear SB 163 on Wednesday, February 6, at 10 a.m., in room 151. This is the bill, which has already passed the Senate, that increases the number of signatures for a newly-qualifying party from 10,000 signatures, to 3% of the last gubernatorial vote, which would be almost 27,000 signatures. The bill does not affect the deadline, which is in January of election years. Nor does the bill alter the time permitted to collect the signatures, which is three months. UPDATE: the hearing will be at 1:30 pm.

If the bill is signed into law, Arkansas law for new parties will be virtually identical to what it was in 2006, when it was declared unconstitutional in Green Party of Arkansas v Daniels.