On May 9, the Federal Election Commission issued Advisory Opinion 2013-01, saying that the 1787 Party does not qualify as a “national committee” because it has never placed a candidate for federal office on the ballot. The Opinion’s conclusion is not novel; this has always been the FEC’s position. Over the last 33 years, various parties have applied to the FEC for “national committee” status. Parties that have been granted “national committee” status are the Democratic, Republican, Libertarian, Socialist, Natural Law, Constitution, Reform, and Green Parties (parties are listed in the order in which they qualified). Parties granted “National Committee” status always received that status after they had participated in at least one regularly-scheduled federal election. The only exception was that the Natural Law Party gained its status in September 1992, before it had participated in an election but after it had demonstrated that it had placed some federal candidates on the ballot.

However, the new FEC opinion seems to hint that a group can gain “National Committee” status if it just runs one federal candidate. That suggests a more permissive stance than the FEC has used in the past. To read the opinion, click on the link above, which takes one to another link provided by the FEC. Click on that link. Then click the “search” box. That brings up not only the opinion, but the submission from the 1787 Party, which describes the party and includes its Bylaws.

Having “national committee” status never has had any impact on whether a minor party presidential candidate can qualify for primary season matching funds. The presidential candidates of the Citizens Party and the New Alliance Party received primary season matching funds, even though their parties never had “national committee” status.

The 1787 Party was apparently formed in January 2013, and says its goal is to “find intelligent and sustainable solutions for our national challenges. Every policy is grounded in extensive research and common sense. There is no preconceived agenda, no inflexible platform, and no misplaced loyalty to special interest groups.” It says it intends to obtain a place on the ballot in 2014 in as many states as possible. Its web page will not be available until June 1, 2013, but apparently that web page address will be www.1787forAmerica.org. Thanks to Political Activity Law for the link to the FEC ruling.

On May 8, the California Assembly Appropriations Committee unanimously passed AB 1419. This is the bill that gives newly-qualifying parties until July of an election year to get on the ballot, if they are only interested in the presidential race that year. The current deadline of January was held unconstitutional last year.

On May 7, proponents of an initiative in Long Beach, California, filed a federal lawsuit against a restrictive California election law concerning validity of signatures on petitions. Section 105 of the California election code says a signature on any type of petition is invalid, if the address of the voter on the petition differs from the voter’s address in voter registration records.

This law, interpreted literally, means that a voter who signs a petition and who then moves and promptly re-registers at the new address, will have his or her signature invalidated. This happens because there is obviously a time lag between the day the voter signs the petition, and the day the petition was checked. While it may seem that this does not happen very often, it did happen often enough to affect one particular initiative this year.

A Long Beach city initiative to legalize medical marijuana was circulated this year. Proponents needed 33,543 valid signatures and submitted 43,159. The city did a random sample of the petition. The results are so close, the random sample will determine that the petition had enough valid signatures only if the California law is construed to validate the signature of eleven particular voters (whose signature were chosen for the random sample) who listed their correct address at the time on the petition, but who then moved and re-registered. If these signatures are not counted, then the petition failed the random sample process. The case is Coltharp v Herrera, central district, 2:13-cv-3263.