The Green Party and the Constitution Party are preparing for a trial in their Georgia ballot access case, which charges that presidential ballot access is too difficult in Georgia for minor parties and independent candidates. On September 11 evidence was filed showing that there have been 401 instances in U.S. history when a state prepared a government-printed ballot in a presidential election, and required more than 5,000 signatures. The evidence shows that in all 401 instances, that state did not ever have more than six candidates meeting that requirement. Furthermore, in the only four instances when six petitions succeeded, all those instances were in Illinois, a state that assumes any petition is valid (even if it has only one signature on it) unless that petition is challenged. When the Illinois instances are taken out, there is no instance when more than five petitions succeeded.

This shows that states that require more than 5,000 signatures simply don’t need to worry about crowded general election ballots. The evidence also shows that Georgia doesn’t require any petitions at all, nor any fee, for presidential primary candidates, if the party leaders approve of them. The evidence shows that in 2012, nine Republicans were on the presidential primary ballot and a majority of them got less than one-fourth of 1% of the vote, yet there is no evidence that having as many as nine candidates on the Republican primary ballot injured anyone, and instead having nine candidates enhanced the voting freedom of Georgia Republican primary voters.

Georgia requires approximately 50,000 signatures for an independent presidential candidate, or the nominee of an unqualified party, to get on the ballot. Each petition sheet must be notarized. No Georgia presidential petition has succeeded in 15 years.

On September 10, the Vermont Progressive Party filed an amended Complaint in Corren v Sorrell, 2:15cv-58. The amended Complaint charges that Vermont campaign finance law is unconstitutional, when it prohibits political parties from spending even one cent on their nominees who have qualified for public funding. The case was originally filed on March 20, 2015, in an attempt to stop the Vermont Attorney General from fining the party’s nominee for Lieutenant Governor in 2014, Dean Corren, $72,000. The Attorney General says that Corren, because he qualified for public funding, could not receive any type of support from any political party. The Attorney General says that when the Democratic Party sent out an e-mail inviting recipients to a rally at which Corren would be speaking, that was a “contribution” to the Corren campaign. Corren in 2014 was not only the Progressive Party nominee for Lieutenant Governor; he was also the nominee of the Democratic Party. Vermont permits fusion.

The amended complaint says the state law violates the U.S. Supreme Court opinion Randall v Sorrell, which in 2007 struck down Vermont contribution limits.

On September 10, a Colorado state court put Karla Heard-Price on the ballot for Colorado Springs school board. She had initially been kept off because two forms were submitted late. The candidate did nothing to fight the administrative ruling. But some voters who wanted to vote for her then filed a lawsuit to get her on the ballot, and the case won, so she is now on the ballot. See this story.

Previously, the Eighth Circuit and the Ninth Circuit had ruled that voters have standing to challenge ballot access laws, even if no candidate-plaintiff is in the same lawsuit.