Nine presidential petitions have been submitted to the Minnesota Secretary of State. If they are all valid, then Minnesota will have eleven presidential candidates on the November ballot. In Minnesota, as in half the states, independent candidates are free to choose a partisan label other than just the word “independent.”

The petitions are for the presidential nominees of these parties: Constitution, Grassroots, Green, Justice, Libertarian, Party for Socialism and Liberation, Socialist, and Socialist Workers. Also one independent presidential candidate. Dean Morstad, filed.

Minnesota had eleven presidential candidates on the November 1996 ballot. Thanks to Jim Ivey for this news.

Terry Michael has this op-ed in USA Today, advocating that the general election presidential debates include all candidates who could theoretically be elected. The column assumes that this would involve a four-way debate, but it is not yet determined whether five candidates or four candidates will be on the ballot in states containing a majority of electoral votes.

The Connecticut Supreme Court has accepted jurisdiction in Republican Party of Connecticut v Merrill. Oral argument will be held on September 12. Connecticut law says the party that polled the most votes for its gubernatorial candidate should be listed first on the ballot. The Republican Party received more votes than any other party for Governor in 2010, but the Secretary of State, who is a Democrat, put the Democratic Party first on the ballot because she adds the votes of the Democratic Party and the Working Families Party together, and that sum is greater than the Republican Party vote total.

Connecticut ought to have a law that provides for either rotation, or random selection, to determine order of parties on the ballot. Approximately one-third of the states do have a policy that gives all parties a chance to appear first on the ballot.