Ballot Access News

Maine Representative Jon Hinck (D-Portland) has introduced LD 153, to shrink the size of each house of the state legislature. The Senate now has 35 members and the proposal would change that to 23, which would give Maine the third-smallest State Senate in the nation (Nevada only has 21 State Senators, and Alaska has only 20). The proposal would lower the number of representatives from 151 to 101.

Maine currently has both an independent State Senator, and an independent Representative. Also, in 2002 and 2004, the Green Party elected a state legislator in Maine. A smaller state legislature would probably make it more difficult for non-major party legislators to be elected. The proposal must receive a two-thirds vote in each house of the legislature to pass. If it did pass the legislature, it would then appear as a proposed Constitutional change on the November 2012 ballot. Bills to shrink the legislature were introduced in 2009, but failed to pass.

On February 3, the California Secretary of State said that Ted Costa’s proposed initiative is now free to begin circulation. It provides that each U.S. House district in California would choose its own presidential elector, similar to the system now used in Nebraska and Maine. The initiative needs 504,760 valid signatures and must be completed by July 5, 2011. Costa is experienced with statewide initiatives and has placed many of them on the ballot in the past. If the initiative gets enough valid signatures, it would probably be voted on at the presidential primary in 2012. It is now impossible to know whether the presidential primary will be in February, March, or June. Current law has it in February but the legislature may change the date.

Kentucky now has closed primaries. Kentucky has registration by party, and only registered members of parties may vote in those primaries. On February 2, the Senate State and Local Government Committee passed SB 41, by Senator Jimmy Higdon (R-Lebanon). It says that independent voters, and also members of unqualified parties, may vote in partisan primaries. The bill would take effect in 2012. Voters who were entirely unregistered as of December 31 of the year before the primary, but who registered as independents in the year of the primary, could not take advantage of the bill’s provisions.

Senator Higdon introduced the same bill in 2010. It passed the State Senate on February 2, 2010, by a vote of 25-12, but then the bill went to the House, which didn’t even hold a hearing on it. Thanks to The Hankster for this news. The Political Science definition for the type of primary system set up by HB 41 is “semi-closed”. By contrast, an “open primary” lets any voter, on primary day, choose any party’s primary ballot. Generally open primary states don’t have registration by party.