Alabama HB 193 and SB 164 are identical bills that would make Alabama ballot access laws even worse than they already are. They would change the independent presidential petition from 5,000 signatures to 3% of the last gubernatorial vote, and move the deadline from August to March. They would also change the petition deadline for non-presidential independent candidates from primary day (which is March in presidential years, and June in midterm years) to 90 days before the primary.
The authors are Senator Bobby Singleton (D-Greensboro) and Representative Artis J. Campbell (D-Livingston). The bills appear to attempt to convert Alabama to a top-two system. However, they provide that Democrats and Republicans still wouldn’t need any petition, but would get on the primary ballot by paying a filing fee, whereas all others would need a petition of 1% of the last gubernatorial vote. The bill also says that party labels would consist of “Republican”, “Democratic”, and “other proper party designation.”
The bills also say that if anyone gets a majority of the vote in the primary, that person would be elected, but the U.S. Supreme Court invalidated a similar law in Louisiana, as applied to congressional elections, in Foster v Love in 1997.
The bills don’t change the definition of “party”, which is currently a group that polled 20% for any statewide race in a general election.
More UNEQUAL stuff – blatant violation of the EPC in 14 Amdt, Sec. 1
— ie one more chance for SCOTUS to clean up the ballot access mess since 1968 ???
NO now super-dangerous extremist robot party hack primaries.
Will the MORON hacks in AL cause Civil WAR 2 to openly start ???
Did Union Army Gen. Sherman liberate the wrong States in 1864-1865 ???
PR and Appv
The real purpose of the bill appears to get rid of the primary runoff. It also may be in response to the recent Senate special election, which took eight months to complete with a primary, primary runoff, and general election.
Alabama has 105 representatives. In the last election in 2014, the Republican or Democratic candidate was unopposed in 63 districts. In 29 of these, the winning candidate was chosen in a primary. There were 19 other districts, where one party dominated by at least a 2:1 margin. In seven of these, the elected candidate was effectively chosen in the dominant party’s primary.
Summary:
Elected candidate chosen in primary: 37(35%), 26 R, 11 D.
Elected candidate sole candidate of dominant party: 45(43%), 33R, 12D.
Elected candidate sole filer: 34(32%), 27R, 7D
Somewhat competitive: 23(22%)
R primary: 8, R elected 7, D elected 1
D primary; 2, D elected 1, R elected 1
Primary: 10, Primary winner elected 8, Primary winner lost general 2.
No primary; 13, D elected 7, R elected 6
That is, 80% of the time when there was a primary, the primary winner won the general election. If there is a good chance of a party winning the general election, it is more likely to attract multiple candidates. The weaker party is more likely to have only one candidate running. It is not necessarily hopeless, but more likely to give a potential candidate second thoughts about putting in the effort (and money).
When there was no primary for either party, it was pretty much a toss-up who would win.
When Alabama was a one-party state, everyone (as long as they were white) ran and voted in the Democratic primary. Oftentimes, there would be a runoff. Statutes in Alabama refer to this both as a primary runoff, and the second primary. The general election, which some persons on BAN refer to as the “real election” was an afterthought.
Alabama has really messy election laws, in part due to being subject to Section 5 of the VRA. If you have to prove you were not intending to commit a crime every time you cross the street, you might avoid crossing the street, The primaries are canvassed by the political parties. If you thought the formatting for the write-in votes was ugly, you haven’t looked at the primary results.
Under current law, primaries are voluntary, and each party can in theory set the qualifications for members and candidates. Alabama does not have partisan voter registration.
It is quite possible that the proposed bill is a work in progress, with the qualification procedure for independent candidates for the general election stuffed into qualification for the primary. Richard Winger appears to have missed that 17-13-41 is deleted by the bill, and so the 20% vote test for a party is undefined.
Were the bill put into law, there would surely be equal protection challenges to the statute. The current system is indefensible, and possible quibbles about qualification due not warrant much attention.
Some person may interpret Richard Winger’s statement about ‘Foster v Love’ as applying to all offices. The federal government simply does not have that authority. Alabama has very few election statutes that apply to federal office. Many states have a section for federal election, and then say what does apply and what does not apply from the more general law.
No primaries.
ONE election day.
Ballot access only via EQUAL nominating petitions or filing fees.
PR [ALL VOTES COUNT] and AppV