This article details expressions of concern by federal judges, that the other branches of the federal government are inadvertently or otherwise injuring the working of the judicial branch.
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On October 8, a New Mexico state court put two candidates for City Council of Las Cruces on the ballot, even though the election is only four weeks from that date. The election is November 5. See this story. The court case was over whether the two candidates really had at least 25 valid signatures.
The absentee ballots had already been printed without the names of the two candidates, but the city clerk has printed up stickers with their names and will add them to the absentee ballots. As a result, the absentee ballots will need to be hand-counted.
On October 12, California Governor Jerry Brown vetoed AB 857. Here is the veto message. This is the bill that requires that 10% of the signatures on a statewide initiative petition must be circulated by volunteers. Here is a short newspaper story about the veto.
The Mischiefs of Faction, a political science blog about political parties, has this piece by Professor Seth Masket about the possibility that the Republican Party might split and a new party might emerge. Masket does not think this is likely, at least in the short term, but it is interesting that he even wrote about the idea.
If the founders of Americans Elect had done what they could to keep their party on the ballot in the 29 states in which it qualified in 2012, that might have been the genesis for a new major party. It is still qualified in California and four other states, but if it doesn’t increase its registration in California by the beginning of 2014, it will lose its spot on the ballot in that state. The drive to put the party on the California ballot required 1,030,040 valid signatures, and probably cost $2,500,000.
The South Dakota Secretary of State has released new registration data, as of October 1. The new percentages are: Republican 45.69%, Democratic 35.21%, independent 18.79%, Libertarian .24%, Constitution .072%. There are six registered members of Americans Elect.
At the August 1 tally, the percentages were: Republican 45.77%, Democratic 35.49%, independent 18.44%, Libertarian .23%, Constitution .069%. There were also six Americans Elect members at that tally.