On April 17, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court cut the number of signatures needed for candidates to get on a partisan primary ballot by 50%.  They also extended the deadline for legislative and local candidates so that it matches the deadline for statewide and congressional candidates, from April 28 to May 5.  Here is the opinion.

The U.S. Senate primary petition drops from 10,000 to 5,000.  The U.S. House primary petition drops from 2,000 to 1,000.  State Senate goes from 300 to 150, and State Representative from 150 to 75.  Also, candidates can now e-mail petition blanks to people who want such a form.  The voter can then either print the petition and sign it in the traditional way, and return it to the candidate by postal mail; or the voter can use modern technology to “sign” the electronic petition and e-mail it back to the candidate.  However, in that case, the candidate must then print the petition signature and transport pieces of paper to the town clerk for verifying the signatures.

The case is Goldstein v Secretary of the Commonwealth, SJC-12931.  Justice Scott Kafker wrote separately to say he is uncomfortable cutting the number of signatures, and that he would have ordered the state to accept fully electronic signatures.  In other words, the candidate should be able to e-mail signed petitions to the town clerk.  But, since the majority did not agree with that idea, Kafker agreed cutting the number of signatures was necessary.  The court arrived at the 50% figure because half the normal petitioning period is within the time period since the health crisis has existed.

The opinion says there is nothing wrong with the primary petition requirement in normal times.  It is unfortunate that no one was in a position to tell the justices that they are wrong.  The Massachusetts petition requirement for primary candidates for U.S. House is the toughest in the nation.  It is so tough that Massachusetts sometimes holds general elections in which over half the U.S. House districts have only one candidate on the November ballot.  That happened in 2008 and 2014.  Massachusetts is the only state in the period starting in 2000 that ever had a majority of its U.S. House races with only one candidate on the November ballot.

On April 16, the SAM Party, a ballot-qualified party in New York, filed an amended complaint in its ballot access case.  As before, the new complaint challenges the requirement that a party must poll 130,000 votes for president, or 2% for president, whichever is more, in order to stay on the ballot.

As the original complaint explained, SAM does not desire to run anyone for president, yet the new law forces it to run for president, or lose its status as a qualified party.  The amended complaint is needed because the law that SAM is attacking was declared unconstitutional in state court earlier this year, so then the legislature passed the same requirement in March 2020 as part of the budget.  The amended complaint explains that New York legislative rules do not permit the legislature to amend the budget bill, so legislators had to vote for the bill or else they had to vote against the entire budget.

The case has a new judge.  It had originally been assigned to Judge Lewis A. Kaplan, but now it is assigned to Judge John G. Koeltl.  Both are Clinton appointees.  SAM Party v Kosinski, s.d. 1:20cv-323.

On April 16, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court heard oral arguments in Goldstein v Galvin, SJ-2020-150, the case in which some primary candidates ask for easier methods to get on the September 1 primary ballot.

Here is an article describing the hearing.  The Secretary of State supports easing the requirements for congress by 50%, but he does not favor easing the requirements for legislature.  He supports moving the deadline for state office petitions from April 28 to May 5 (the congressional primary petitions are due May 5).

The plaintiffs favor a cut for all petitions to one-third of the existing requirement, and a later deadline, and use of electronic signatures.

The Court is aware that a proposal similar to the Secretary of State’s recommendations passed the State Senate on April 16, and they expressed a wish that the House would pass it quickly, but there is no guarantee, and there is very little time.  The bill is S2632.  All it does is cut the number of signatures for U.S. Senate from 10,000 to 5,000; the number of signatures for U.S. House from 2,000 to 1,000; and the number of signatures for Governor’s Council from 1,000 signatures to 500 signatures.  It only applies to 2020, not future years.