On June 4, a South Carolina conference committee passed SB 2, the “Equal Access to Ballot Act.” The bill is helpful, although one could argue that its title exaggerates what it actually does. It provides that all candidates, incumbents and challengers alike, are treated the same relative to filing campaign finance documents. Under current law, incumbents didn’t have the same requirements to file certain campaign finance documents that challengers did.

More important, the bill provides that when a legally required campaign finance document is not filed in a timely way, the candidate is fined, but still appears on the primary ballot. Assuming this bill now passes both Houses and is signed into law, it would prevent a recurrence of what happened in 2012, when over 200 candidates for state and local office were kept off primary ballots because they had not filed certain campaign finance documents both in paper and electronically. See this story. The conference committee had been appointed May 2, and it took over a month before it finalized the bill language.

If South Carolina truly had an “equal access to ballot” law, it would let independent candidates get on the general election ballot without a petition, if they paid the same filing fee that primary candidates must file. That idea was not discussed and has nothing to do with the contents of the actual bill. South Carolina petitions for independent candidates for the legislature are tied with Georgia and North Carolina for being the most restrictive in the nation. They require 5% of the number of registered voters to sign the petition for legislative independent candidates.

U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg died on June 3. Because New Jersey was holding a gubernatorial election anyway on November 4, 2013, a date that is more than 70 days in the future, there will probably be a special U.S. Senate election to fill the vacant seat on that day. The normal petition deadline for independent candidates, and the nominees of unqualified parties, this year for state office, is June 4, 2013. Obviously the special U.S. Senate election will have a different deadline, one that is closer to the general election. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the news about the special election. See this story.

Ian Milhiser, a Policy Analyst for the Center for American Progress, has noticed that New Jersey election law appears to contradict itself on the date of the special election. 19:3-26 says because the seat became vacant more than 70 days before the November 4, 2013 regularly-scheduled state election, the U.S. Senate election must be that day also. But 19:27-6 says that special U.S. Senate elections will only be held if the vacancy was created more than 70 days before the primary, which this year is June 4, 2013.

The June 2 Richmond Times-Dispatch has this editorial, praising last week’s decision that eliminated Virginia’s ban on out-of-state petition circulators.