On March 29, this brief was filed in the California Court of Appeals, in Field v Bowen. At this point, the only issue remaining in this case is whether the individuals who sued to overturn two undemocratic aspects of California’s top-two law should be required to pay $243,279 in attorneys fees to the Proposition 14 supporters who intervened in the lawsuit. The linked brief is the opening brief, so it was filed by the opponents of the existing system, asking that the award for attorneys fees be overturned. The intervenors will file a brief in a month. UPDATE: here is the transcript in a parallel case, Chamness v Bowen, from the February 2013 Ninth Circuit hearing. Plaintiffs are asking the California Court of Appeals to take judicial notice of that transcript.

Mark Solomon is a retired history professor who has also been active as a socialist. He has written this article in Political Affairs, suggesting that these four socialist groups should talk about merging: (1) the Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism; (2) the Communist Party USA; (3) Democratic Socialists of America; (4) Freedom Road Socialist Organization.

None of these four groups has run candidates for public office under their own name in several decades, if ever. The Committees of Correspondence was formed in 1991 by Communist Party members who left the Communist Party that year. Democratic Socialists of America was formed half a century ago by former Socialist Party members who had decided to work within the Democratic Party (although in its first decade it was called the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee). The Communist Party last ran its own presidential nominee in 1984. Thanks to Jack Ross for the link.

One of the Nevada Secretary of State’s omnibus election law bills this year is AB 48. It makes many miscellaneous election law changes, including a provision that says the qualified smaller parties must notify the state of their presidential and vice-presidential nominees in August. This is discriminatory, because the law would continue to let the two major parties notify the state in early September. The Independent American Party (the Nevada state affiliate of the Constitution Party) is working with the Secretary of State and the legislature to amend the bill.

The bill passed the Assembly Legislative Operations and Elections Committee on March 28, with an understanding that the provision mentioned above will be taken out of the bill, or at least some satisfactory solution will be found.