On April 17, a Cowlitz County Superior Court in Washington state struck down a law that said if a voter signs a petition twice, even though he or she is a registered voter, neither signature should count. See this story. The case is Patella v Kimsey, 13-2-00212-5. Thanks to Paul Jacob for this news.
In a few states, various parties are working on getting on the 2014 ballot. The Libertarian Party has begun its Hawaii petition, and has approximately 150 signatures. The requirement is 706 signatures. The Constitution Party is working to obtain 1,000 registered members in Louisiana, and believes it now has 130. The Green Parties of Arizona and Nevada are also working on registration drives. The Nevada requirement is either 9,738 signatures or 9,738 registrations. The state won’t tally how many Greens there are until and unless they get enough. The Arizona requirement cannot be known exactly but it will probably be approximately 22,000 registrants and Greens have approximately 5,200 registrants.
Arkansas requires 10,000 signatures, but they must all be collected in any 90-day period of the party’s choice. Both the Libertarian Party and the Green Party are raising money and getting organized so that they can do their drives during the last three months of 2013.
On April 22, the Constitution and Green Parties of Georgia appealed their presidential ballot access case to the 11th circuit. The case is Green Party of Georgia v State. The lawsuit was filed in 2012 and pointed out that the U.S. Supreme Court and the Eleventh Circuit have both ruled that ballot access for President has more protection than ballot access for other office (Georgia is in the 11th circuit). The U.S. District Court had dismissed the case last year before the state had even answered the complaint. The U.S. District Court Judge decision missed the main point of the lawsuit, that the unfavorable Georgia ballot access precedents do not relate to presidential elections.
Georgia is one of only two states in which no petition concerning presidential ballot access has succeeded during the last twelve years. The other such state is Indiana. The U.S. Supreme Court has said in Storer v Brown and Mandel v Bradley that a key indicator that a ballot access lawsuit is unconstitutional is how often it is used successfully.
On April 17, Washington Governor Jay Inslee vetoed part of SB 5518. If he had signed it, it would have inadvertently increased the difficulty for new minor parties to place presidential nominees on the November ballot. The veto would not have occurred if the Freedom Socialist Party had not noticed the problem, and persuaded the Secretary of State to ask the Governor to veto part of the bill. In Washington state, Governors can veto parts of bills; they don’t need to sign or veto the entire bill.
Existing law lets minor parties hold multiple nominating conventions at various places around the state. At least 1,000 voters must sign in as having attended one of these meetings. Meetings, to be valid, must have at least 25 attendees. Obviously it is far easier to get a total statewide attendance of 1,000, if the signatures can be collected at different places around the state. But independent presidential candidates must get all of their 1,000 signatures in one location.
SB 5518, by changing the definition of “minor political party” for campaign finance purposes, unthinkingly also changed it for ballot access purposes, so that a minor party that had not appeared on the ballot in the last presidential election would have needed to get all its signatures in one place. The Freedom Socialist Party did not place its presidential nominee on the ballot in Washington state in 2012, so if it does intend to place a presidential nominee on the Washington state ballot in 2016, it would have been adversely affected. Also adversely affected would have been any other party that comes into existence for the 2016 election. Thanks to Fred Hyde for this news.
On April 20, Howard Phillips, founder of the Constitution Party, died. He was age 72 and lived in Virginia. Thanks to Darcy Richardson for this news. UPDATE: here is a New York Times obituary.
