On March 10, Maine held a special election to fill the vacancy in the State House, district 93.  The vote was:  Democrat Anne Beebe-Center 52.89%; Republican James Kalloch 44.51%; Green Ronald Huber 1.97%; Libertarian Shawn Levasseur .64%.  See this story.

When this same seat had been up in November 2014, the vote had been:  Democratic 52.01%; Republican 47.99%.  The Republican nominee had run in November 2014 as well as in the recent special election.  Because this district had one of the closest votes in November 2014, there was considerable suspense as to who would win the special election.  That probably kept the minor party vote lower than it would have been otherwise.

UPDATE:  this article explains the unusually high spending by the major parties in this race, and why the stakes for them were so high.

On March 10, the Peace & Freedom Party of California, the Libertarian Party of California, and the Green Party of Alameda County asked the California Supreme Court to hear their ballot access appeal.  The case is Rubin v Padilla, S224970.  The suit argues that the top-two system, in practice, unconstitutionally prevents minor party voters from voting for their preferred candidates in the general election.

On March 9, the opening brief was filed in the Superior Court of New Jersey, Appellate Division, in D-R Organization of New Jersey v Guadagno, A-206-14.  This case was filed in the trial court in August, 2014, but the courts ruled that it should have been filed directly in the Appellate Division, so now that is where it is.

The issue is the proper interpretation of election law 19:5-1, which says, in part, “no political party which fails to poll at any primary election at least 10% of the votes cast in the State for members of the General Assembly at the last general election, held for the election of all members of the General Assembly, shall be entitled to have a party column on the official ballot at the general election for which the primary election has been held.”

In June 2014, the turnout in both major parties was so low that neither party had enough voters in its primary to satisfy the law.  However, New Jersey election officials gave both major parties their own party column anyway.  Check back in a day or two to read the brief.  The plaintiff, the D-R Organization, is a minor party that exists only in New Jersey.  It listed many candidates on the general election ballot last year, and expects to have even more in this year’s election for state legislature. New Jersey elects its state officers in odd years.