On September 30, U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson, a Carter appointee, ruled that Alabama cannot require independent candidates, and unqualified parties, to comply with the 3% petition requirement, in instances when the petitioning time is limited. Hall v Merrill, m.d., 2:13cv-663. In this particular case, James Hall tried to get on the ballot as an independent candidate for U.S. House in a special election held in 2013. He needed 5,938 valid signatures and was only able to get 2,835. There were only 56 days between the date the deadline was set, and the deadline. However, the state argued that Hall really had 106 days to petition, because he could have been petitioning as soon as the incumbent member of Congress said he would resign soon, in the middle of his term.
Hall testified that he did try to collect signatures before the date of the special election was announced, but until the date of the special election was announced, virtually no member of the public was aware there would soon be a special congressional election, and it was thus especially difficult to get signatures during that period.
The decision is 68 pages and is very thorough. It points out that for a regularly-scheduled election, an independent candidate could take as long as ten years to finish his or her petition; the state doesn’t set a start date so there is essentially infinite time to collect the signatures. That is very different from a special election, which cannot be predicted.
