Janavi Mehta, a writer for the student newspaper The Guilfordian, at Guilford College, Greensboro, North Carolina, has a strikingly clear and concise column explaining the role of minor parties in the U.S. Thanks to Ken Bush for the link.
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On November 8, the Montana Green Party filed this 19-page brief in Montana Green Party v Stapleton, 6:18cv-87. The issues are two aspects of the petition procedure for new parties: (1) the March 15 deadline is too early; (2) the distribution requirement violates one person, one vote.
Courts have been unanimous (except for one peculiar Utah decision from 1972) that distribution requirements for statewide petitions are unconstitutional, if the distribution requirement gives the voters of some geographical areas more power than it gives the voters of other areas. Generally an unconstitutional distribution requirement offends one person, one vote, if the number of signatures required inside each area is the same, but the population of the areas varies.
Montana’s distribution requirement, unique in the history of state ballot access laws, is the opposite. The areas have equal populations, but the required number of signatures inside each area varies widely. Montana requires signatures inside at least 34 state house districts to equal 5% of the winning candidate for Governor’s vote inside that district. That requirement varies hugely, from 55 signatures, to 150 signatures. So the voters of the districts with only 55 signatures have more power to get a party on, than the voters in the districts that require 150 signatures.
This may sound arcane, but it is firmly established in precedent, including the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1969 decision Moore v Ogilvie. Thanks to Jim Riley for news that this brief had been filed.
On November 8 and 9, two interesting amicus briefs were filed in the U.S. Supreme Court in Utah Republican Party v Cox, 18-450. Here is the amicus of CATO Institute, the Pacific Legal Foundation, and Freedom Partners Chamber of Commerce.
Here is the brief of Private Citizen.
So far the state of Utah has not waived its right to file a response. The issue is whether the First Amendment’s Freedom of Association clause protects the right of a political party to decide for itself how it nominates candidates. The Utah Republican Party is willing to nominate by primary, but it wants to limit individuals on its primary ballot to those who have shown substantial support at a party meeting.
At the recent election, Lane County, Oregon voters narrowly rejected STAR voting, a new idea for a voting system. It received 48% and if it had pased, it would have been used to elect county officials. Lane County includes Eugene, the home of the University of Oregon. It is not easy for new ideas for voting systems to be accepted. See this story. Thanks to Leonardo Quevado for the news.
On November 2, the Sixth Circuit issued an opinion in Libertarian National Committee v Holiday, 17-6216. The case concerned a U.S. Senate debate in Kentucky in 2014, when Senator Mitch McConnell was running for re-election. The Libertarian Party petitioned for a place on the ballot in that race, and hoped to be included in candidate debates. The party perceived that Kentucky Educational Television set rules for inclusion in that debate, but then when it realized that the Libertarian might qualify, it changed those rules. The new rules required that the candidate have raised at least $100,000 and be at 10% in the polls.
The decision barely mentions that evidence, and upholds the debate exclusion. The decision even says that debate sponsors need not have any objective criteria, much less that the sponsor must publish those criteria. The decision erroneously says that the Kentucky Libertarian Party is not automatically on the ballot. That was true in 2014, but it is not true now, and the decision should have clarified that. The decision is by Judge Raymond Kethledge (a Bush Jr. appointee), and signed by Judges Alice Batchelder (a Bush Sr. appointee) and Helene White (a judge who was first nominated by Clinton but didn’t get confirmed until Bush Jr. re-appointed her).