On March 2, 2015, U.S. District Court Judge Stewart Dalzell, a Bush Sr. appointee, struck down three Pennsylvania ballot access barriers, but only as applied to the Green Party and the Libertarian Party. The laws are: (1) the ban on out-of-state circulators; (2) the requirement that each petition sheet be notarized; (3) the prohibition on a voter signing for more than one minor party in any given election year.

(As to the notarization part of the decision, it interprets Pennsylvania election law to not require notarization of petitions, but it also says that if the law did require notarization, it would be unconstitutional. The law says the circulators must sign the petitions in their capacity as “affiants”. The state has always believed an “affiant” is someone who appears in front of a notary, but the decision says that is not necessarily so).

Judge Dalzell ruled against the minor parties on the issue of whether unregistered voters can sign petitions, and in a supplementary decision on May 11, he upheld the law that doesn’t permit signers from different counties on the same sheet. The case is Green Party of Pennsylvania et al v Aichele, e.d., 2:14cv-3299.

He also ruled that some of the other problems are moot, because the state has already voluntarily eased them. The state already agreed that the signers don’t need to include the year, when they fill in their date of signing. Also the state already agreed to drop language from the petition that implies it is still unconstitutional for circulators to live outside the district or outside the state. Finally, the state already agreed to eliminate blank space for presidential elector candidates on the state-printed petition forms, if the group doesn’t have candidates for presidential elector. Eliminating the spaces for presidential electors increases space for more signature blank lines on a single sheet.

Oddly, the relief is limited only to the plaintiffs in the case, the Green and Libertarian Parties. There will probably be new lawsuits filed by other plaintiffs, which probably will result in an expansion of the relief to all petitioning groups, at least for general election petitions.

The North Carolina Supreme Court has expedited the lawsuit Dickson v Rucho, 201 PA 12-3. All briefs will be in by July 27, and the oral argument will be on August 31. The issue is whether the U.S. House and legislative districts violate the 14th amendment. Opponents of the redistricting plan argue that the legislature packed too many African-American voters into certain districts, which reduces their influence in too many other districts. Thanks to the Brennan Center for this news.

Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren (D-California) has introduced HR 2173, which would require all states that have more than one member of the U.S. House to have independent redistricting commissions to draw U.S. House district boundaries. Here is the text of the bill. It has 27 co-sponsors so far, all of them Democrats.

The Commission in each state would have 12 members. Four would be members of the largest party, four would be members of the second-largest party, and four would be all other voters. The chair would be a member of the latter group. The commissions could not consider the voting history of any region of the state, nor the party registration data, when they draw the lines. Also they could not take into account the residence of any incumbent member of Congress.

If the U.S. Supreme Court rules this month or next month that states cannot have independent redistricting commissions established under state law, and that only the state legislatures can draw the boundaries, this bill would still be constitutional because the same part of the U.S. Constitution (Article One, section four) gives Congress the power to override state election laws concerning congressional elections. Thanks to the Brennan Center for this news.