On February 10, three Montana corporations asked the U.S. Supreme Court to let them make independent expenditures in the 2012 election. The case is American Tradition Partnership, Inc., v Attorney General of the State of Montana, no number assigned yet. Here is the document.

On December 30, 2011, the Montana Supreme Court had ruled 5-2 that Montana’s law, making it illegal for corporations to make independent expenditures supporting or opposing candidates for state office, is constitutional. This decision seems to contradict the U.S. Supreme Court opinion Citizens United v Federal Election Commission, issued in 2010, and of course the request to the U.S. Supreme Court points this out. The document to the U.S. Supreme Court is not only a request that the U.S. Supreme Court take the case, but that the Court also issue a stay of the Montana Supreme Court’s ruling while the case is under consideration. Thanks to Thomas Jones for this news. UPDATE: the U.S. Supreme Court has already asked Montana to respond, and that response is due February 15, only five days from now. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the update.

On February 9, the Massachusetts State Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Libertarian Political Association v Galvin, sj 2011-0348. The issue is whether Massachusetts law lets unqualified parties use a stand-in presidential candidate on its ballot access petition, and then, if the stand-in withdraws, whether the state party can replace him or her with the actual presidential nominee of that party.

The state takes the position that unqualified parties can never replace the person listed on the petition with anyone else. Near the end of the hearing, when the attorney for the Secretary of State was speaking, Justice Ralph Gants asked what would happen if the person listed on the petition for either President or Vice-President were to die. Justice Gants wanted to use a concrete example, so he asked what would have happened if the person listed for vice-president on Ross Perot’s 1992 petition were to die after the petition had been submitted, and there was little or no time remaining for a new petition to be submitted by the deadline. The attorney for the Secretary of State said the Perot campaign would have been “out of luck”. That answer was the only logical response that could have been given, but it illustrated the problems with the state’s position. A decision will probably come fairly quickly.

On February 10, the U.S. Court of Appeals, D.C. Circuit, heard arguments in Libertarian Party v D.C. Board of Elections, over whether the U.S. Constitution requires the Board to count valid write-in votes for president at the general election. Judge David S. Tatel’s comments and questions seemed to indicate that he believes that the Board of Elections’ interest in saving money is more important than the right of voters to have their valid votes counted, but Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh seemed to have the opposite opinion. The D.C. Board already counts other kinds of write-ins. For example, in 2004, the D.C. courts ruled that the Board must count write-in votes in the Green Party’s primary, in a case called Best v D.C. Board of Elections, 852 A.2d 915. The third judge on the panel was Merrick Garland, and it was not easy to ascertain which way he leans.

According to this news story, Rick Santorum will appear on the Indiana Republican presidential primary ballot unless any voter challenges his petition before February 17. Marion County election officials checked his petition and determined that he was short 24 signatures in the 7th U.S. House district. The law requires 500 signatures from each U.S. House district. But, in Indiana, primary petitions are presumed valid if no one challenges.