July 22 was the deadline for candidates to file for the Louisiana general election of November 8. Here is the list of candidates. For U.S. Senate, 24 candidates filed: nine Republicans, seven Democrats, two Libertarians, and six candidates who are either independents or who are registered into an unqualified party. One of the nine Republicans is David Duke, who was the Populist Party presidential nominee in 1988.

For U.S. House, Louisiana has six districts. All districts have at least two candidates on the November ballot, although no Republican is running in the 2nd district, and no Democrat is running in the 5th district. Libertarians are running in the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 6th districts. A Green is running in the 1st district. The Reform Party is ballot-qualified but it has no candidates for Congress.

North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory still hasn’t acted on SB 667, which was sent to him by the legislature on July 1. It changes the order of candidates on the ballot, for State Court of Appeals races. Current law says candidates are listed in random order. Party labels appear on the ballot but parties do not nominate candidates for that office. If the bill is signed, candidates who are listed as Republicans will automatically be listed first. The bill says that candidates who are members of the party that won the last gubernatorial election are listed on top. McCrory is a Republican.

The Bangor Daily News has this story about the Maine Libertarian Party. It quotes the state chair, Chris Lyons, as saying that the news that the party is ballot-qualified for the first time since the period 1991-1992 has caused a great upsurge in support for the party.

The New Hampshire Libertarian Party also experienced substantial growth in 1991, after the party had unexpectedly and surprisingly become a qualified party in that state in November 1990 by polling over 3% for Governor. Within a few months, four state legislators had switched to the Libertarian Party. Thanks to Thomas MacMillan for the link.