On September 15, the New Hampshire Ballot Law Commission determined that Shawn O’Connor, an independent candidate for U.S. House, 1st district, should remain on the ballot. Democratic Party officials had challenged his position on the ballot, on the grounds that some of his signers had also signed a petition for another petitioning candidate for the same office. But the Commission ruled 4-1 that the law forbidding signing for two candidates can’t be enforced, because the petition form does not warn signers that they can’t sign two petitions for the same office. See this story.
The U.S. House race, 1st district, has five candidates on the ballot: a Democrat, a Libertarian, a Republican, and two independents.
It used to be the case in Massachusetts that a signer couldn’t sign for more than one petition for candidate to the same office. The checkers in the town clerks’ offices would check off the voting list whenever a signer’s name was on a petition, and then invalidate any subsequent signatures by that voter. The law was changed in 1990, when initiative Question 4 was passed, which reformed the petitioning process in that state.
Allegedly ALL persons in a State know 24/7 about ALL laws in such State —
aka– Ignorance of the LAW is NO excuse.
In Texas, the petition must explain that a voter can not sign two petitions for the same office. In addition the circulator must point to that text and read it aloud. When Kinky Friedman and Carole of The Many Names were running for governor, the petitions had to fully checked because of the possibility of duplicate signatures (samples aren’t very good for detecting those).
Petition-level support should allow multi-voting. Candidates don’t all come out with petitions at the same time, so it’s impossible to make a single, informed, selection at that time. A voter choosing to support one candidate with an early petition who finds a better candidate later is then left in the lurch, unable to contact the previous petitioner (if they even remember who had the petition at the time, and unable to choose to support a better candidate. Furthermore, the concept of multi-voting as an early screening tool is well-known, and effective, at least by well-educated individuals; which are rather scarce in this state.
Apparently you can comment without giving your real name. Who is Demo Rep, I wonder. In my opinion, a signer cannot be expected to know of a hidden law when he/she is asked to sign a petition. What is the real reason that Democrats do not want O’Connor on the ballot? Did they also challenge the other two independents for 1st District Congress?
Just another stupid law that shouldn’t exist.