This year is the first presidential election since 1964 in which no independent presidential candidate petitions succeeded in Mississippi. The state only requires 1,000 valid signatures, due in September. The only such petition submitted this year was for Jill Reed for President and Tom Cary for vice-president, but the petition lacked enough valid signatures. Reed lives in Casper, Wyoming and campaigns as the nominee of the Twelve Visions Party. She is on in Colorado but not in any other state.

Mississippi allows groups to become qualified political parties, simply by demonstrating that they have party officers in the state. Therefore, most of the nation’s nationally-organized political parties enjoy party status in Mississippi, and don’t need to use the independent petition procedure. Mississippi’s law on how parties get on the ballot was passed in 1890 and has never been amended. The law shows that, at least for small-population states, there is no need for restrictive ballot access laws for political party ballot access.

On September 10, a CNN/ORC poll for the presidential race was released. See the results here. Scroll down to question 4, to find results for all candidates for registered voters, and for likely voters.

The registered voters show: Obama 50%, Romney 41%, Gary Johnson 4%, Jill Stein 2%, undecided/other 1%. This only adds up to 98%, so chances are the percentages for several candidates were on the verge of being rounded up.

The likely voters show: Obama 51%, Romney 43%, Johnson 3%, Stein 1%, undecided/other 2%.

Here is a link to the South Carolina Election Commission’s web page, showing candidates for President who are on the ballot. There will be five presidential nominees on the ballot, those nominated by the Democratic, Republican, Constitution, Green, and Libertarian Parties.

South Carolina has three ballot-qualified parties that only exist in that state, and which didn’t nominate anyone for President. They are the United Citizens Party, the Independence Party, and the Labor Party. In the past the United Citizens Party has nominated presidential candidates. In 2008 it nominated Barack Obama for President. Even though South Carolina permits fusion, though, something went wrong and Obama was only listed on the ballot as the Democratic nominee. In 2000 it nominated Ralph Nader. In 2004 it nominated Walt Brown, the Socialist Party nominee.

Also in the past, the Independence Party nominated Ross Perot for President in 1996, and Ralph Nader for President in 2004. Back in 1996 its name was the Patriot Party.