Ballot Access News has just learned that Pennsylvania is still distributing voter registration forms that don’t include any parties except the Democratic and Republican Parties. However, the Libertarian Party polled enough votes in November 2008 to be a recognized party under Pennsylvania law, so the state’s forms are obsolete and violating Pennsylvania’s own law.

Oklahoma behaved in much the same way in 1996 and early 1997, in regard to the Reform Party, which was a qualified party in Oklahoma starting in May 1996 and extending through November 1998. Oklahoma also kept using old registration forms that didn’t list the Reform Party as a choice. The Reform Party sued in December 1996 and the state gave in. That case was Reform Party of Oklahoma v Ward, 96-cv-1834-R.

The lapse is worse in Pennsylvania than it had been in Oklahoma. Oklahoma doesn’t give a political party any particular rights just because it attains a certain level of registrants. But Pennsylvania says a party’s nominees may not be on the November ballot automatically unless it has registration membership of 15%, so leaving the Libertarian Party hurts its ability to meet that goal.