Klark Byrd, news editor of the Dickinson Press (a daily newspaper in Dickinson, North Dakota) here recommends that readers sign the petition to put the Libertarian Party on the ballot for the 2014 election. Currently, the only ballot-qualified parties in North Dakota are the Democratic and Republican Parties. The Libertarian Party needs 7,000 valid signatures to appear on the 2014 ballot.
On July 6, Mike Duggan started his campaign for Mayor of Detroit. See this story, which explains how he hopes to place first or second in the August non-partisan primary, even though he is being forced to be a write-in candidate.
The New Jersey Libertarian Party has a state meeting on July 13. It is possible the party will nominate someone for the special U.S. Senate election being held on October 16, 2013. The petition deadline is August 13 at 4 p.m.
As far as is known, no independent candidates, and no other minor parties, have already announced any intention to run in that election.
On October 7, U.S. District Court Judge J. Michael Seabright will hear oral arguments in Democratic Party of Hawaii v Nago, 1:13cv301. The party asks that the open primary, as applied to the Democratic Party, be enjoined and held unconstitutional.
The party’s opening brief says, “The State has consigned the most sensitive and important function of any political party, its nomination of standard bearers and exemplars of its deepest values, to persons who not only have no necessary relationship to the party, and are unknown to the party, but may, and in many cases no doubt do, reject and abjure the values of and membership in the party.”
The brief sets forth possible arguments against the party’s position and attempts to rebut them. To the argument that “the Hawaii Democratic Party is so dominant that the primary is frequently decisive and voters who are not Democrats would be disenfranchised if not allowed to vote in the Democratic primary,” the brief says, “Voters who are uncomfortable with the status quo may feel free to organize an alternative.”
Ironically, the Justice Party, which tried very hard to get on the Hawaii ballot in 2012 and failed, has an ongoing lawsuit against the Hawaii February petition deadline for new parties to get on the ballot. The Justice Party lawsuit is pending before the very same judge who is hearing the Democratic Party’s case.
On July 5, the Green and Constitution Parties filed their reply brief in Pisano v Bartlett, the case in the Fourth Circuit that challenges the May petition deadline for newly-qualifying party petitions in North Carolina. Here is the text of that reply brief. A side issue is whether the U.S. District Court should have permitted the parties to engage in discovery.
