Recently, Oregon passed a bill saying all adult citizens known to the state will be automatically registered to vote, unless an individual, upon being notified that he or she had just become registered, then declines to be registered.

All these new automatically registered voters are being listed as independent voters, unless they return a form choosing a party. Consequently, the number of registered voters in Oregon is in the process of expanding. But because most minor parties keep their ballot-qualified status by having a certain percentage of voters as members, one accidental consequence of the new voter registration system is that minor party share of the total registration will shrink.

On March 2, the legislature passed two bills, SB 1501 and SB 1599, saying that for purposes of determining the qualified status of political parties, the denominator for both 2016 and 2018 will be the number of registered voters in the state as of July 2015. That will keep the Independent Party above 5%, which it needs to keep its status as a party entitled to a primary. It will also make it easier for the state’s qualified minor parties to remain qualified. They need either one-half of 1% of the registration, or a vote of 1% for any statewide race at either of the last two elections plus registration of one-tenth of 1%.

California also recently created automatic voter registration, but California solved this problem permanently. The new California law for automatic registration creates a new category of voters, for party affiliation purposes. That new category is “undeclared”. An “undeclared” voter is one who has never made any choice about partisan affiliation, either to be an independent or to be a party member. For purposes of the voter registration test for keeping parties on the ballot, “undeclared” voters are excluded from the calculation.

The Ninth Circuit will hear Arizona Green Party v Reagan, 14-15976, on Wednesday, May 11, at 9 a.m., in San Francisco. This is the case that challenges Arizona’s February deadline for petitions to establish a political party. The Arizona primary is in August. The case arose around the 2014 election, when the Green Party submitted all its signatures to be a qualified party a few weeks late, because they couldn’t get the job done by the deadline. Even though the party brought all its completed petition sheets into court, to show the judge that they had done the job, U.S. District Court Judge Neil Wake said the party hadn’t presented any evidence that the February petition deadline is burdensome.

Judge Wake did say that the party could use those petitions to qualify for 2016, so the effort wasn’t entirely wasted. The Green Party is on the ballot in Arizona now.

The United States government response brief in Tuaua v U.S., 15-981 in the U.S. Supreme Court, was due on March 2. However, the government asked for, and received, an extension of time to April 1. This is the case about the meaning of this part of the Fourteenth Amendment: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.” The voters who brought the case were born in American Samoa and argue that they should be deemed citizens, and should not need to go through the naturalization process. Most of the voters who brought the case live in one of the fifty states, but they can’t vote because they haven’t used the naturalization process. Famous attorney Ted Olson represents them.

According to this statement on the web page of the supporters of the case, seven amicus curiae briefs are being filed in the U.S. Supreme Court. The U.S. Supreme Court already shows that the amicus briefs of the Puerto Rican Bar Association, some scholars of constitutional law, and the League of United Latin American Citizens, have been filed. Thanks to Rick Hasen for that link.