The U.S. Supreme Court conference of October 27 will again consider whether to hear Minnesota Voters Alliance v Mansky, 16-1435. It had also been considered at two prior conferences this month, but the Court did not make up its mind at either of those conferences whether to hear the case. The issue is a Minnesota law that makes it illegal for a voter at the polls to wear any clothing, or anything attached to clothing that is visible, that relates to politics.
Because the new North Carolina petition requirement for new parties is so much better than in the past, the North Carolina Constitution Party hopes to petition for party status and to appear on the 2018 ballot. The party has never before been on the North Carolina ballot. The change in the law occurred last week, when the legislature passed SB 656, which lowers the petition to slightly under 12,000 signatures.
The State Board of Elections keeps a list of petitions that are underway. The Constitution Party has already registered with the State Board of Elections, so that the Board’s webpage will keep a tally of the validated signatures, as the validation process proceeds. North Carolina election officials check petitions on an ongoing basis; there is no need for the petition to be completed before the validation process starts. Here is the link to the State Board of Elections’ mention of the Constitution Party petition.
On October 15, Austria held a Parliamentary election, using proportional representation. Five groups polled at least 4% of the vote and therefore gained representatives in Parliament. The results are: Austrian People’s 62 seats; Social Democratic 52 seats; Freedom 51 seats; New Austria 10 seats; Peter Pilz List 8 seats.
No party received a majority of the seats, so the Austrian Peoples Party formed the government with help from the Freedom Party. See the wikipedia page about the election.
The Green Party had had 24 seats, but because it only polled 3.8%, it lost its seats.
On November 7, 2017, New York voters will decide whether to call a state constitutional convention to consider ideas for revising the New York Constitution, which has been in effect since 1894. Every twenty years the voters of New York are given this opportunity.
Some scholars have put together a list of ideas that might be considered for a new Constitution. The publication is issued by the Rockefeller Institute of Government and Albany Law School.
Many powerful groups have passed resolutions saying the New York State Constitution is good enough now and that voters should vote “no”. They include the Association of State Court Judges, many labor unions, and the ACLU. Thanks to Thomas Jones for the link. Note especially the ideas for altering election law, which start on page seven.
On October 23, the Maine legislature passed LD 1646. It suspends ranked choice voting in both 2018 and 2020, and repeals it effective 2021 if the Maine State Constitution doesn’t get changed by then to permit ranked choice voting in general elections for state office. The procedure to change the Maine constitution starts with a two-thirds vote of the legislature.
The House initially passed a version of the bill that would have allowed ranked choice voting to be used for primaries, and for congressional elections, in 2018. But the Senate amended it to suspend ranked choice voting. Finally, after many votes, the House agreed to the Senate version. Here is the Senate roll call. Generally Democrats voted in favor of ranked choice voting and Republicans voted against it. The Senate vote was 19-16.
Supporters of ranked choice voting are free to launch a referendum petition against LD 1646, and they may do so. If the referendum gets enough signatures, there would be another vote of the people. The voters had passed ranked choice voting a year ago.
