On April 10, several North Carolina legislators from both major parties introduced HB 794, to improve ballot access. The bill lowers the number of signatures for newly-qualifying parties, and statewide independent candidates, from 2% of the last gubernatorial vote cast, to one-fourth of 1% of that same base. For 2014, this would reduce the petition from 89,340 signatures to 11,168 signatures.

The bill also moves the petition deadline from mid-May to early July, and lowers the vote test for a party to remain on the ballot from 2% for President or Governor, to one-fourth of 1% for President or Governor. Parties with less than 10% of the voter registration would be permitted to nominate by convention instead of by primary.

Independent candidate petitions for district office would be lowered from 4% of the number of registered voters, to 1%.

If the bill passes as written, the only states that would require more than 50,000 signatures in 2014 for a newly-qualifying party would be California, Georgia, and Oklahoma. Thanks to Brian Irving for the news about the bill.

On April 9, the New York city Libertarian Party held a nominating convention, and nominated Joe Lhota for Mayor and Kristin Davis for Comptroller. However, Lhota (who does favor decriminalizing marijuana) then said he would not accept the Libertarian nomination. He is one of the candidates seeking the Republican nomination.

It is alleged that Lhota would not have won the Libertarian nomination, except that 40 newcomers attended the convention and cast votes for him. It is conceivable that the party will now hold a new citywide nominating convention.

Bills are pending in the Rhode Island legislature to abolish the straight-ticket device. On April 10, supporters of those bills released a study, showing that in November 2012, the Speaker of the House would probably have been defeated by an independent candidate if the straight-ticket device did not exist.

Only two candidates were on the ballot in November 2012 in the State House race for the 4th district: Gordon Fox, the Democratic nominee and the House speaker; and independent candidate Mark Binder. The vote was: Fox 3,590; Binder 2,595. In that district, 1,469 voters used the straight-ticket device for the Democratic Party. This shows that the voters who did not use the straight-ticket device preferred Binder. The data suggests, but cannot prove, that the straight-ticket device changes election outcomes. Independent candidates do not have their own straight-ticket device, and it is probable that most of the voters in 2012 who used the straight-ticket device didn’t even notice who the candidates for State House were.