Ballot Access News

Bills have been introduced in at least nine states to provide that certain presidential candidates may not be listed on ballots unless a birth certificate is submitted to elections officials. Some of these bills only relate to presidential candidates running in a presidential primary. Others relate to presidential candidates on the November ballot.

Bills that only relate to candidates running in a presidential primary are: Indiana SB 114; and Oklahoma SB 91 and SB 384.

Bills that cover all candidates who seek to run in the general election are: Connecticut SB 391; Nebraska LB 654; Oklahoma SB 540; and Texas HB 295 and HB 529.

Bills that cover some candidates in the general election, but not all of them, are: Arizona HB 2544; Georgia HB 37; Missouri HB 283; Montana HB 205.

When the bills attempt to cover nominees of qualified parties in general elections, they vary according to who is supposed to furnish the birth certificate. Connecticut’s SB 391 is the strangest, because it puts the requirement in the passive voice, so as to avoid saying who is supposed to furnish the document. It says the bill “requires the Secretary of State to be presented with an original birth certificate.” Nebraska’s LB 654 requires the officers of the national party nominating convention to furnish the certificate. Arizona’s HB 2544, and Georgia’s HB 37, require the national committee of the party to furnish it. Missouri’s HB 283 requires the state party officers to furnish it. Texas’ HB 295 and HB 529 require the presidential candidate to furnish it. Oklahoma’s SB 540 doesn’t say who is to furnish it, but says any voter can challenge the ballot status of a presidential candidate’s citizenship.

A strange bill in Maine, LD 34, requires independent presidential candidates, but no other presidential candidates, to submit a birth certificate. Thanks to Bill Van Allen for news about these bills.

The January 27 Chicago Tribune has this op-ed, suggesting the Illinois State Appeals Court was mistaken when it ruled that Rahm Emanuel does not meet the duration of residency requirement to run for Mayor of Chicago. The authors of the op-ed are attorneys who openly acknowledge that they have been active in support of Emanuel’s candidacy and/or his legal case.

Since 1879, California’s Constitution has required candidates for the legislature to have lived in their district for at least one year before the election. Yet the California Secretary of State and Attorney General have not enforced this Constitutional provision since the mid-1970’s. They say the California Constitution violates the U.S. Constitution.

However, case law does not support the idea that duration of residency requirements for candidates (for office other than Congress) as short as one year violate the U.S. Constitution. Heidi Fuller, a candidate for the California legislature in 2010, filed a lawsuit a year ago to enforce the California Constitution. She had an opponent in the Republican primary for State Senate, Tom Berryhill, who unambiguously did not fulfill the requirement. A Superior Court Judge agreed that she had standing, and that the court had jurisdiction to hear her case, but he ruled that the California Constitutional requirement violates the U.S. Constitution. For almost a year, the California press has ignored the Fuller lawsuit. However, on January 27, Capitol Weekly carried this story about her lawsuit. The article points out that in all the pleadings filed in the Rahm Emanuel lawsuit over whether he meets the Chicago one-year duration of residency requirement, no one on either side has even hinted that the Chicago one-year rule violates the U.S. Constitution. That’s because the U.S. Supreme Court has made it clear that duration of residency requirements for candidates do not violate the U.S. Constitution, something that California officials have refused to acknowledge. The Fuller lawsuit is pending in the State Court of Appeals in Sacramento. It is Fuller v Bowen, C065237. Briefs are being filed.