The New Jersey Globe, an on-line newspaper covering New Jersey politics, has this story about the Moderate Party, a party that exists only in New Jersey. It is a new party that supports fusion, and it intends to file a lawsuit soon, arguing that the New Jersey state constitution protects the right of parties to jointly nominate a candidate.
Too bad there are no “Sound Money Democrats” any more, who are mentioned in the photo caption.
We could use a Grover Cleveland again today.
IMO, fusion should be up to the candidates and parties, and the state election authority should defer to their preferences. If a candidate wants to run a fusion campaign, and the parties involved agree to it, it should be allowed.
IMO, fusion is in accordance with the basic principle of Eu v San Francisco, which recognizes that political parties are private associations.
@WZ, When States are organizing and recognizing the nominating process, political parties are public bodies. See Smith v. Allwright and Terry v. Adams. If candidates ran as individuals then groups could collectively support the candidate. Voters might be told that the Moderate and Democratic political clubs had joined together to support Malinowski.
@JR:
States have only “organized and recognized the nominating process” since the so-called Progressive Era. Prior to that, all parties were free to nominate and support any candidates that they wanted What would happen on Election Day is that the supporters of each party would print up slate ballots with the names of their nominees and distribute them at the polling places. Voters who didn’t want to vote the “slate” would create their own ballots.
All that was lost with the authorized, pre-printed ballot, which we now use, and which permits the state to be “gate-keepers” of the ballot by having the state decide who may run or not run. This has been the case for so long (+100 years), that the vast majority of voters cannot imagine anything else.
While a standard ballot has certain advantages in terms of facilitating voting and counting, it deprives the parties, and ultimately the voters, of choices that they might prefer to make.
But, modern technology now makes possible expanding partisan and voter choices. Ballots can be made available on-line, with spaces available for independent, minor parties, and even voters to print out a ballot at a home computer, with the names of alternative candidates clearly printed, the ballot conveniently printed out, and conveyed by the voter to the polling place.
Such a system would assert the associational rights of all political parties, the greater freedom of the voters, and restrict the gate-keeping power that the state now has over the ballot.
Individuals are nominated / elected –
NOT *parties*.
SCOTUS – brain dead party hack ignorant on the matter.
Fusion is for lazy people and fake political parties. It should be outlawed everywhere.
@WZ,
In the city where I live, individuals file for office and their name is printed on the ballot. Groups of individuals may associate with that candidate helping them collect signatures for petitions or helping paying a filing fee or helping pay for advertising, or block walking. Groups may distribute slate cards whether they’re from the Democratic Political Club or the Moderate Political Club or just from the Citizens or Bob Smith for Mayor.
Modern TOTAL R-O-T began with PREZ GC
—
official primaries in 1889-1890
MAJOR depression [worst until 1929-1933 Great Depression]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1893
– modern donkey econ rot – inflate, devalue dollar, etc.
the lawsuit is not yet filed? i wonder which clauses of the new jersey constitution they will point to. federally, twin cities area new party allowed fusion bans, and is controlling, although it’s a poorly argued decision. new york had fusion based on its state constitution for many years. i think that this was recently taken away, and the lawsuit failed to argue the state constitution, but i am not really up on the latest news.
The right to vote implies the right to make choices If a state has restrictive ballot laws, it is, in fact, depriving voters of choices that they might prefer to make. It is the most insidious form of voter suppression because it takes place before the ballot is even printed.
At the very least, write-in votes should be allowed, counted, and recorded.
Ultimately, voters and parties ought to be allowed to print their candidates names on ballots that may be used at the polling place. Modern technology now makes this possible
@WZ,
When candidates run as indiduals, ballot access laws are usually less restrictive, since all candidates must meet them.
When parties nominate candidates, the incumbent parties tend to erect barriers. “We proved our modicum of support in the prior election, it would serve no purpose to collect eleventy-seven signatures like our erstwhile opponents must.”
I agree with President Trump!