On February 5, the Alabama House passed HB 67, which lowers the cost of the list of registered voters from approximately $38,000, to exactly $1,000. The vote was 85-16. All of the “No” votes were cast by Democrats, although some Democrats voted for the bill.

On February 10, the Senate County & Municipal Committee passed the bill.

The Libertarian Party some years ago had filed a lawsuit against the law that required unqualified parties to pay the full $38,000. But the lawsuit lost, even though the U.S. Supreme Court in 1970 had summarily affirmed a decision of a 3-judge court in New York that if the government gives a free list to the qualified parties, it must give the list free to unqualified parties that were petitioning. Having the list is valuable if a party wants to check validity of a petition that it is about to submit. The Alabama existing law gives a free list of the voters to qualified parties.