On April 2, the California Senate Education Committee passed SB 1322, by a vote of 6-1. It removes an old unconstitutional law that makes it impossible for a member of the Communist Party to be hired as a public school teacher. Although this is not an election law bill, it has election law implications. If this bill is signed into law, it will probably be possible to pass another California bill in the near future, to delete election laws that bar Communists from running from office, and ban “subversive” parties from the ballot. As noted in an earlier post, only five states besides California have such laws still on the books.
The P&F types will be jumping with joy. They can finally put Gus Hall on the ballot. 🙂
Actually, Gus Hall ran in the PFP primary in the past. These laws are not enforced.
It means Stalin could work as a teacher in California? The noise you hear are 55 million dead spinning in their graves.
The law on teachers was declared unconstitutional in 1967 by the California Supreme Court. Stalin (were he alive) could have been a teacher ever since 1967. These bills are about cleaning up the law books so that what is on the books matches what is actual policy.
Perhaps the legislature should awap the ban on red schoolreachers with a ban on republican teachers.
After all the GOP is a party of torture, spying, extrodinary rendition, and promotes the elimination of habeas-corpus.
Kids should not be exposed to this sort of thing.
The Socialist Party USA has always had the trouble of getting our Presidential Ticket on the ballot in Louisiana because although you only have to pay a filing fee of $500 you have to submit a handful of electors. The problem is that Louisiana is so right wing that electors were reluctant to serve, since they could suffer retribution, real or imagined. So we had to come up with a substitute label without the dreaded word “Socialist.”