Filing has closed for candidates to put themselves on California primary ballots. The primary is June 3. California has 53 U.S. House districts.
All six qualified parties in California will have fewer nominees for U.S. House in 2008 than they did in 2006, except that the Republican Party has the same number in both years. Below is the number of districts in which each party will have a nominee, in 2008; the 2006 number is in parantheses.
Democratic: 51 (52)
Republican: 46 (46)
Libertarian: 20 (25)
Green: 5 (7)
Peace & Freedom: 5 (8)
Constitution: 1 (2)
In theory, the parties could gain nominees by write-ins at the primary, but the law requires a write-in candidate in a partisan primary to poll a large number of votes, in order to be deemed nominated. Even the major parties have trouble with that requirement; no Republican or Democratic was able to gain a write-in nomination in 2006 for U.S. House.
Remember, the California Natural Law, Reform and [socialist/ feminist] Peace and Freedom parties were all knocked off the ballot via different Secretaries of State within the 21st Century. The Peace and Freedom Party was bounced twice recently.
The Constitution Party or Independent voters claim to have all those members in California but only one candidate for congress. Go figure?