According to this story, it is likely that the Maine legislature will preserve public funding for legislative candidates (with a 20% boost), yet eliminate it for gubernatorial elections. Thanks to Thomas MacMillan for the link.
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On June 19, the Santa Fe County Democratic Party will sponsor a forum, on the subject of whether the Democratic Party should let independent voters vote in Democratic primaries. See this announcement.
New Mexico was one of the last states to hold partisan primaries. Before 1938, all parties in New Mexico nominated for all office by party meetings. Ever since 1938, New Mexico primaries have been closed to all but party members. In New Mexico, smaller qualified parties still nominate by convention.
As is well-known to most readers, Pennsylvania is the only state in which the validity of petitions can only be determined by a court, and the proceedings for statewide petitions in court runs to hundreds of thousands of dollars. Back on March 13, 2013, but not previously noted here, a Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court issued a 14-page opinion, explaining why the Libertarian Party of Pennsylvania cannot recover court costs from the people who objected to the party’s statewide petition, even though the Libertarians won the court case and did appear on the ballot.
Page ten of the opinion says “Although the large number of erroneous challenges (by the people who challenged the Libertarian petition) is disturbing, it does not by itself show bad faith by Objectors where Objectors also affirmatively cooperated to resolve the validity disputes by stipulation and there was a substantial amount of error on both sides.” This decision tends to illustrate how arbitrary the Pennsylvania system is, on the variable of when court costs are or aren’t awarded. It also shows how vague the system is on the variable of when the winning side must request payment. Thanks to Tom Stevens for the link to the opinion.
The June 10 Roll Call has this analysis of how California’s top-two primary system has increased the power of the Democratic and Republican Party organizations. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link.
Alabama will hold a special election for U.S. House, First District, in late 2013. Congressman Jo Bonner says he will resign from Congress in August 2013, so the state hasn’t formally set the special election yet. However, it is already known that any independent candidate, or any nominee of a party other than the Democratic and Republican Parties, will need 5,938 signatures. Minor party petitions in Alabama need not list the name of the nominee; the petition merely mentions the party. Therefore, any party that wishes to enter this race is free to be petitioning now to get on the ballot. For independent candidates, though, the petition must list the candidate.
No minor party or independent candidate for U.S. House has been on the Alabama ballot since 2010, when the Constitution Party placed a nominee on the ballot in this very same district. That candidate, David Walter, polled 17.0% against Congressman Bonner. No Democrat ran in the 2010 race.