On September 14, the Libertarian Party of New Hampshire filed a notice of appeal in its ballot access case. In the First Circuit, the case (Libertarian Party of New Hampshire v Gardiner) is case no. 15-2068. The issue is the 2014 law that made it illegal for a group to circulate the party petition during an odd year.

The other federal election law case in New Hampshire, concerning the state law that makes it illegal to photograph one’s own voted ballot and then show the picture to anyone else, will also be in the First Circuit. That law had been struck down on August 11, 2015, and the state filed its notice of appal on September 2. That case is Rideout v Gardiner, now no. 15-2021.

All sides in the lawsuit Utah Republican Party v Herbert have agreed that Greg Bell should be the mediator, to try to settle the lawsuit. One issue in the lawsuit is whether the state can force the Republican and Constitution Parties to let people onto their primary ballots even if those candidates have not shown any support at a party endorsements convention. The other issue is whether the state can force those two parties to let independent voters vote in their primaries.

It is unusual for a political party freedom of association lawsuit to go to arbitration. See this story.

On September 22, the independent candidates who are challenging the Arkansas March petition deadline asked for reconsideration. Last month a U.S. District Court in Arkansas had said that early petition deadlines are constitutional if the number of signatures is small. That Court upheld the deadline. The case is Moore v Martin, e.d., 4:14cv-65.

The case has no effect on presidential independent deadlines. Independent presidential candidates in Arkansas have an August deadline.

The request for reconsideration points out that early petition deadlines are unconstitutional all by themselves, regardless of how many signatures are required. The U.S. Supreme Court in 1983 struck down the Ohio March petition deadline even though Ohio only required 5,000 signatures, which at the time was only one-tenth of 1% of the electorate. Furthermore, the Arkansas non-presidential independent candidate petition requirements are not easy. Arkansas requires 10,000 signatures for statewide office, which is about 1% of the normal vote cast in presidential years, and 1.5% of the normal vote in midterm years. Independent candidates for district office need petitions of 3% of the last gubernatorial vote within that district. Arkansas independent petition requirements are considerably more difficult than the median requirements of the 50 states.