On June 18, the Mexican American Legal Defense & Educational Fund filed a brief with the U.S. Supreme Court, asking the Court to leave the recent Ninth Circuit opinion in Gonzalez v Arizona intact, at least for now. The Ninth Circuit had ruled several weeks ago that Arizona must accept the federal voter registration postcard forms. Arizona acknowledges it must accept the forms, but the state requires some add-on questions that are not on the federal form. The Ninth Circuit had construed the federal postcard registration law to mean that the federal form, all by itself, is sufficient and the state can’t require extra information.

The information that Arizona wants is proof that applicants are citizens. The federal form asks people to say under penalty of perjury that they are citizens and otherwise eligible to vote, but does not require additional documentation. See Scotusblog’s report on this case, which includes a link to the MALDEF brief. There is also a link to a second brief, filed by an ally of MALDEF, which discusses the problem that Arizona’s law creates for some residents of American Indian reservations.

Arizona will file a final brief by June 20, and then there will probably be a quick response from the U.S. Supreme Court, to determine if the Ninth Circuit ruling stands during the next few months.

See this interesting article at Fairvote, about a letter written by former President James Madison in 1823, suggesting a different way to choose the president. The article has a link to Madison’s letter. Madison wanted to give each congressional district one electoral vote. Also he wanted to end the system under which, when no one gets a majority of the electoral college vote, the House elects the President, with one vote per state.

Madison wanted to change the electoral college to give each elector two votes for President, a first choice and a second choice. And he believed that if no one got a majority, with either the first or second choice votes, then the entire Congress should choose the President, with each member of each house of Congress having one vote.

On June 18, Massachusetts Representative Dan Winslow (R-Norfolk) said he will introduce a bill in 2013 to let unqualified parties have flexibility to choose their presidential and vice-presidential nominees in the late spring or summer of election years. This bill has yet to be fleshed out. It might permit an unqualified party to circulate a petition to qualify itself, without the need to list any candidates to be listed on the petition. Already, 39 other states have such a procedure.

Winslow is virtually certain to be re-elected in November 2012, because no one is running against him. Winslow understands the problems with the Massachusetts Supreme Court’s opinion of June 18, because he has been the ballot access attorney for Americans Elect. He was already planning some other election reforms bills for 2013 as well.