On April 15, the Federal Election Commission asked U.S. District Court Robert L. Wilkins to change his mind about his March 18 ruling that said the Libertarian Party is entitled to a hearing in the U.S. Court of Appeals in its bequest lawsuit. The lawsuit, filed in 2011, complained about federal campaign laws that don’t permit a political party to receive a large bequest all at once. Judge Wilkins had said the case is strong enough that it deserves to be heard by the U.S. Court of Appeals. Judge Wilkins had also said, “the anti-corruption interests that would be implicated by allowing the Libertarian National Committee to receive the entire bequest all at once may be minimal.”

The FEC request for rehearing says that it isn’t proper for any federal court to consider whether any particular large donation to a political party should be allowed on the grounds that the donation doesn’t appear to be needed to prevent corruption. It says if the court allows a special hearing on this one type of request, that will open the door to many more future cases in which parties will try to argue that other proposed large donations also deserve an exemption. The FEC also points out that this particular case is no longer very important, because it has been delayed so long already, by 2014 the Libertarian Party will have received the last part of the bequest in any event. The bequest was left in 2007.

The Hawaii Democratic Party has decided to sue the state, to overturn the state’s law that requires the party to hold an open primary to choose its nominees. The complaint is already in the process of being drafted. Other states in which major parties have sued to rid themselves of an unwanted open primary include Idaho, Virginia, and South Carolina. Republicans were the plaintiffs in those states. The Idaho Republican Party won its lawsuit; the Virginia Republican Party won a partial victory; the South Carolina lawsuit is still going on.

Minor party activists are working very hard to influence state legislators in at least four states, to either support bills for easier ballot access, or to oppose bills that make it worse.

In Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Ballot Access Committee recently e-mailed every state legislator. Also Constitution Party activists recently met with the Senator who chairs the Senate State Government Committee. These are all attempts to persuade the legislature to pass SB 195, which eases ballot access for minor parties and independent candidates. The bill has been introduced in three sessions of the legislature, including the current one, but so far it has not made any progress. This year, the bill has co-sponsors from both major parties. Recently State Senator John Blake (D-Archbald) became a co-sponsor.

In Montana, Libertarian Mike Fellows is spending the day at the capitol on April 17, lobbying against SB 408, the bill that would put a referendum on a top-two open primary on the November 2014 ballot. The bill may receive a third reading vote in the House on April 17 or April 18. It has already passed on second reading in the House, but it was amended, so even if it passes third reading, it must go back to the Senate. The amendment says that when only two candidates file for the June primary, no primary for that office is held, and the two candidates appear on the November ballot.

In North Carolina, activists have scheduled meetings with all members of the House Elections Committee who have not already said that they support HB 794, the ballot access reform bill.

In California, activism is helping to delay or defeat the bills to restrict write-in candidates’ ability to move on to the November election; and also to help defeat the bill to make it a crime for a party to pay registration drive workers on the basis of how many registrations in any particular party they obtain. The association of California election officials does not support the bill, nor does the Secretary of State, and the ACLU is opposed to it.