On December 12, the North Carolina Democratic Party filed a federal lawsuit, alleging that it was unconstitutional for the state legislature to eliminate partisan primaries for judicial races. North Carolina Democratic Party v Berger, m.d., 1:17cv-1113.

In October 2017, the legislature passed SB 656, which eliminated primaries only in 2018 for judicial elections. Judicial elections in North Carolina are partisan elections. But the bill provides that every individual running for a judicial post will appear on the November ballot, with party labels, but there will not be party nominees. The Complaint alleges that this violates freedom of association for political parties.

The reason the Republican majority in the legislature eliminated primaries for 2018 for judicial office is that the legislature expects to consider redrawing the boundaries of various judicial districts in time for the 2018 election. But because the primary is in May, and filing begins in February, the legislature didn’t expect to have the new districts ready in time for the primary.

The case is assigned to Judge N. Carlton Tilley, a Reagan appointee. Thanks to Brian Irving for this news. UPDATE: here is the Democratic Party’s brief. A weakness in the brief is that it doesn’t discuss either New York State Board of Elections v Lopez-Torres, nor Washington State Grange v Washington State Republican Party. The former decision upheld a New York law that did not permit judicial candidates to directly petition for a place on the primary ballot. The latter one said that Washington state did not necessarily violate a party’s freedom of association by permitting party labels on the ballot even though there were no party nominees.

Last year, independent presidential candidate Rocky De La Fuente sued Virginia over the requirement that his candidates for presidential elector were being forced to reveal their entire Social Security numbers to the state, before his petition (which lists candidates for presidential elector) could begin to circulate. De La Fuente argued that this made it more difficult for him to recruit candidates for presidential elector. Virginia requires one presidential elector candidate to reside in each of the state’s eleven districts.

The lawsuit is De La Fuente v Alcorn, e.d., 1:16cv-1201. It has already survived several attempts by the state to have the case dismissed. On December, both sides agreed to hold a settlement conference on January 4, 2018, at the federal courthouse in Alexandria, at 1:30 p.m. It is likely that both sides will come to some agreement to resolve the issue.

On September 19, 2017, professional petitioner Darryl Bonner and Alaska Libertarian activist Scott Kohlhaas filed a federal lawsuit against the Alaska law that bans out-of-state circulators for initiative petitions. Bonner v Bahnke, 3:17cv-202. On October 20, the state said it would not attempt to defend the ban, and so a stipulated judgment and order was issued. Out-of-state circulators can now circulate initiative petitions in Alaska, and they are permitted to cross out language on the petition saying they are Alaska residents.

Alaska never had a ban on out-of-state circulators for candidate petitions.

An earlier lawsuit against the Alaska ban, Raymond v Fenumiai, filed in 2012, failed on procedural grounds. The out-of-state circulator-plaintiff in that case, Robert Raymond of Wisconsin, did not allege any particular initiative petitions he wanted to work on, so he was deemed not to have standing by both the U.S. District Court and the Ninth Circuit. But in the newer case, Bonner specified four particular initiatives he wanted to circulate, so he did have standing. Thanks to Ken Jacobus for this news.