On August 22, U.S. District Court Judge D. Brock Hornby enjoined a Maine campaign finance law that lets individuals contribute twice as much money to a candidate for state office who is nominated by primary, relative to a candidate who qualifies for the November ballot by petition. The case is Woodhouse v Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices, 1:14cv-266.

The case had been filed by individuals who wanted to donate to an independent candidate for Governor, Eliot Cutler. The law says they can only donate $1,500. But the law lets individuals contribute $3,000 to candidates who run first in a primary, and then, if they win the primary, in the general election. The decision says, “I do not lightly find a state statute unconstitutional. But these four Maine residents have shown a strong likelihood of success on the merits of their claim that in this election they have suffered unconstitutional discrimination as compared to contributors to party candidates.” Thanks to Thomas MacMillan for the news.

On August 19, the Tennessee Libertarian Party filed this brief in Lewis v Goins, 3:14-1565, over whether the party’s nominee for Governor should be on the ballot with “independent” or “Libertarian” as his ballot label. The basis for the case is that the existing law on how parties get on the ballot has been held unconstitutional. The Green and Constitution Party nominees in this year’s election are already on the ballot with their party labels.

A new party called the Tax Wall Street Party petitioned for status as a party in Nebraska this year. It wanted to run Dan Buhrdorf for U.S. Senate. However, the party’s attempt failed because it didn’t gather enough signatures in the Third U.S. House district, the districts that includes the western and central part of the state and has no large population centers. Here is the Nebraska party’s web page; here is the party’s national web page.