On Decembere 14, South Carolina Representative Rick Quinn (R-Lexington) said he will introduce a bill soon to require a special election for U.S. Senate vacancies. Current law in South Carolina and in most states says that when U.S. Senate seats become vacant, the Governor appoints a replacement, who serves until the next regularly-scheduled election.
The bill was prompted by the recent announcement that U.S. Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina is about to resign.
On December 14, West Virginia and California state elections officials finished tallying the votes, so now all results are in, except that Alaska, the District of Columbia, Iowa, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Nebraska, New Jersey, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, and Wyoming have not tallied any write-ins for any presidential candidates (although some of those states have tallied the total number of presidential write-ins). States that would have counted write-ins for any declared presidential candidates, but in which no such candidates filed successfully, are Missouri, North Dakota, and Tennessee. States that don’t permit write-ins for President are Arkansas, Louisiana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and South Dakota.
The West Virginia returns for the candidates who were on the ballot are: Mitt Romney 417,655; President Obama 238,269; Gary Johnson 6,302; Jill Stein 4,406; Randall Terry 3,806 (independent). West Virginia write-ins will be released next week.
The California returns are: Obama 7,854,285; Romney 4,839,958; Johnson 143,221; Stein 85,638; Roseanne Barr 53,824 (Peace & Freedom); Thomas Hoefling 38,372 (America’s Independent Party); and these write-ins: Ron Paul 21,461; Rocky Anderson 992; Virgil Goode 503; Stewart Alexander 82 (Socialist); Jerry White 79 (Socialist Equality); James Harris 72 (Socialist Workers); Stephen Durham 54 (Freedom Socialist); Sheila “Samm” Tittle 6.
It appears the national returns are now: Obama 65,587,127; Romney 60,848,326; Johnson 1,273,667; Stein 466,877; Goode 121,823; Barr 67,318; Anderson 42,397; Hoefling 40,601. Check back here later for national totals for the other candidates who were on the ballot in at least one state.
On December 12, Cathy Stewart, coordinator of the New York City Independence Party, issued this detailed explanation of how the party goes about finding members for its local committees in New York city. The response is fascinating because it shows how much work is involved in maintaining an active party in New York and other states in which party members in each precinct have the right to elect party officers. Probably no party, other than the Democrats and Republicans, has such an extensive list of elected party officers.
The leading activists of the New York city Independence Party do this hard work because it is the only way they can maintain control over the New York city Independence Party, given that the state Independence Party officers are hostile to the New York city officers. The state officers of the party would dearly love to take control of the city party, but they can’t because the city party activists out-organize them.
Control of the New York city party is important because it determines who can run in the party’s primaries for the three citywide partisan offices, especially Mayor. New York city holds such elections this year.
The only states that have not finished tabulating the vote for president, at least for candidates on the ballot, are California and West Virginia, but both expect to release final figures by the end of the day, December 14. West Virginia would have been finished earlier except that Marshall County’s final tally is still incomplete.
However, write-ins remain to be tallied in some states. For example, Massachusetts says it won’t have the write-in tallies for the declared write-in presidential candidates until mid-January.
