Massachusetts Representative James J. Dwyer (D-Woburn) has introduced two bills for earlier primaries. Currently, Massachusetts has a presidential primary in March, and a primary for all other office in September.

HB 574 would move the non-presidential primary from September to June, but would not change the date of the presidential primary. HB 575 would move both primaries to June.

Both bills irrationally move the petition deadlines for independent candidates, and the nominees of unqualified parties, to dates that have already been held unconstitutional in Massachusetts and in the U.S. Supreme Court. HB 574 moves that petition independent deadline to from July to March, except that presidential petitions would move from July to June. HB 575 is even worse, and moves all independent petition deadlines, even for President, to January. When one reads these bills, it helps to understand that in Massachusetts, the deadline for submitting the signatures to the Secretary of State is four weeks later than the deadline to submit the signatures to the town clerks. So when the bills talk about the deadline for signatures to be given to the Secretary of State, that really means the signatures are due a month earlier than the month mentioned in the bills.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Anderson v Celebrezze that Ohio’s March 20 deadline for independent presidential candidates is too early, so obviously a January deadline would be void. A Massachusetts state court in 1985 invalidated the old Massachusetts May deadline, in Serrette v Connolly. Thanks to Josh Putnam for the news about the bills.