Montana Green Party Petition is Valid

On March 6, the Montana Secretary of State announced that the 2020 Green Party petition has enough valid signatures. The requirement is 5,000, and the party petition had 11,000 signatures. This is the first petition success for the Green Party (relative to getting on the 2020 ballot) since the November 2018 election.

Meanwhile, the party is still in U.S. District Court over the unequal distribution requirement for that type of petition. The law requires signatures from at least one-third of the state house districts. But even though house districts are presumed to have equal populations, the law requires that in some districts as many as 150 valid signatures are needed, while in others the requirement can be as low as 55 signatures. Such a law clearly violates the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Moore v Ogilvie, an Illinois decision that said when distribution requirements exist for statewide petitions, all the voters in each district must be treated equally. The Montana law gives more power to voters in some house districts than in others.

The lawsuit is Montana Green Party v Stapleton, 6:18cv-87.


Comments

Montana Green Party Petition is Valid — 9 Comments

  1. Although I am not in the Green Party, I am happy for them that their work has paid off for them. The political process needs more, not fewer, voices.

  2. Any update on how many states the Green Party & Libertarian Party will be on in November ?

  3. Why is it OK (constitutional) to have differing numbers of voters per legislative district?

  4. It is unknown who paid for the petition, and the Green Party has semi-disavowed it, saying they would not endorse any senate or house candidates, but were glad to be on the presidential ballot. A candidate has filed for US Senate. If a second candidate files, the party will have a primary ballot. Party legislative candidates have a $15 filing fee, which can be waived if the candidate is unable to pay. The filing deadlin is March 9.

    In 2019, the Montana legislature passed a bill that required campaign finance reporting for groups trying to qualify political parties. This already existed for candidates and backers of initiatives. The bill was at the the behest of Governor Steve Bullock, a Democrat, and managed to pass on a semi-party line vote, with all Democrats voting for and Republicans 50-50.

    Club for Growth Action had registered earlier this year to petition, but then said they had decided not to, and would not be filing any signatures they had collected. The financial report is not due until April 15. In Montana, individual circulators file the actual petitions with county officials. The county officials then verify the signatures and pass the counts on to the SOS.

    Presumably the Democrats will sue in part based on the lack of registration, but that might not be the basis for disqualificaion, but rather only assessment of a fine. They are likely also scrutinizing signatures. In 2018, one circulator apparently did not witness all the signatures on his sheets, and all the signatures attributed to him were discarded.

    This time collection included Gallatin, which includes Bozeman and Montana State, and has the 3rd largest number of registrations, which should provide a few more qualifying districts. In 2018, the original qualification was in 38 districts, which the Democrats managed to knock down to 32 districts.

  5. Bob G, that information is usually in the print edition of Ballot Access News. It costs only $18 per year for 12 issues.

  6. MT- one more STONE AGE primitive regime of gerrymander oligarchs

    — due to the post Civil WAR Elephants trying to have permanent Elephant CONTROL of the USA Senate.

    Abolish the USA Senate and EC.

    MT — infamy in the person of Sen Mike Mansfield – Senate *leader* stooge HACK of KILLER Prez LBJ during the Vietnam WAR
    —-
    PR
    Appv
    TOTSOP

  7. I heard that Republicans paid for this Green Party drive with the hope that Greens will siphon votes from Democrats. If true, from the Greens perspective, at least they will be on the ballot, so good for them.

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