According to this story, Pennsylvania Democratic gubernatorial candidate John Hanger said at a Progressive Forum on February 28 that he supports ballot access reform. Unfortunately, the other five Democratic gubernatorial candidates do not support it.

Pennsylvania easily has the nation’s worst law, on the question of which parties are automatically on the November ballot. The median law of the 50 states says a party’s nominees are automatically on the general election ballot if that party polled 2% of the statewide vote in a previous election. But in Pennsylvania, a party is not ballot-qualified unless it has registration membership of 15% of the state total (over 1,000,000 registered members). This law is so extreme, if the same law existed in Idaho or Utah, the Democratic Party would not be ballot-qualified. If that law existed in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, or the District of Columbia, the Republican Party would not be ballot-qualified.

The existing law on how a party remains on the ballot would be eased if SB 195 were to pass. Before 1986, Pennsylvania had an easy standard for a party to be ballot-qualified. For years between 1893 and 1986, a party was ballot-qualified if one of its statewide nominees in the previous election had polled a number of votes equal to 2% of the highest vote-getter’s vote. But in 1986 that easy standard was changed to 15% registration. Thanks to Randy LoBasso for the link.

The Federal Election Commission has now obtained a second postponement of its response in Free Speech v Federal Election Commission, 13-772, which is pending in the U.S. Supreme Court. Originally the FEC’s response was due February 3; then it was put over until March 5; and now it is due April 4. Here is an earlier blog post about that case.

Probably the FEC attorneys find it difficult to respond, not knowing what the U.S. Supreme Court will be saying soon in McCutcheon v FEC, which was argued back on October 8, 2013, and which still doesn’t have a decision. Both cases concern campaign finance. The Court has not yet accepted Free Speech v FEC, and the government’s response, when it is filed, will undoubtedly argue that the case should be rejected.