Two New Hampshire Representatives, one Republican and one Democrat, are sponsoring HB 1403. It would convert New Hampshire from a state with party column ballots, to a state with office-group ballots.
Over the last thirty years, almost every state has switched to an office-group ballot, in which the ballot is organized by particular offices. For each section for a particular office, all of the candidates for that office are listed neatly.
The only states that still have party-column ballots are New Hampshire, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey (in most counties), and Delaware.
The two New Hampshire Representatives sponsoring the bill are Timothy Lang, a Republican from Belknap County; and Charlie St. Clair, a Democrat from Belknap County. Thanks to Darryl Perry for this news. Here is the bill.
I’m surprised the SOS office didn’t testify on the bill. I’m also surprised at how many members of the committee were confused about what the ballot would look like if it was changed from the party columns.
Luckily, I thought to print out a couple of sample ballots from Colorado & Louisiana.