The Tennessee Elections Coordinator has been in the process of revising the petition form for independent candidates. State law says any independent candidate (for any office) needs 25 signatures. In the past, an independent candidate could get on the ballot with only a single candidate for presidential elector. In 2004 the state re-interpreted the law to say that a presidential candidate must have a full slate of presidential electors, so that meant eleven different petitions, but each could be signed by the same 25 voters.

Last month, the state re-interpreted the law again, and said independent presidential candidates need a petition bearing the names of all eleven elector candidates, and that that petition needed 275 names. At this point, the law still seemed fair. But now, the state is insisting that only a single petition form (which would be stapled at the top, and have approximately 10 sheets of paper fastened together) may be circulated. No photocopies would be allowed. The state would simply give a single petition (with sheets of paper fastened together) to the petitioning group.

This would be wildly impractical, since that single petition would need to be signed by each of the eleven candidates for presidential elector, nine of whom must each live in a different US House district. It would also be impractical because it would prevent more than a single volunteer from ever working at any given moment. Tennessee state elections officials are still stuck in the mind-set of their normal procedure, under which a petition only needs 25 signatures. The Socialist Party, which has been doing a good job of gathering this information, is still negotiating with the state.