This year, Colorado will have sixteen presidential candidates listed on its ballot, the highest number of presidential candidates on a general election in U.S. history, except that Colorado also had sixteen in 2008. However, there have been many instances when states had more candidates than that on their presidential primary ballots. This post was updated on September 15 to correct some errors.

Colorado has five qualified parties, and those parties’ nominees, of course, are on the ballot automatically. They are the Democratic, Republican, Constitution, Green, and Libertarian Parties.

Then there are eleven candidates who qualified by paying the $500 fee and submitting a list of presidential elector candidates. They include four parties with “socialist” or “socialism” in their name: the Socialist Party, the Socialist Workers Party, the Socialist Equality Party, and the Party for Socialism and Liberation. The Party for Socialism and Liberation presidential candidate in Colorado is Gloria LaRiva, because the party’s actual presidential candidate, Peta Lindsey, is under age 35.

Then there are two independent presidential candidates: Jill Reed of Wyoming, and Sheila Tittle of Virginia.

Finally, there are four other minor parties: Justice Party, running Rocky Anderson; Peace & Freedom, running Roseanne Barr; Objectivist, running Tom Stevens; American Third Position, running Merlin Miller; and America’s Party, running Tom Hoefling. Thanks to William Fenwick for the Colorado list. The Colorado deadline for independent candidates, and the presidential nominees of unqualified parties, to pay their $500 was August 8.

See this story. Yet another lawsuit has been filed to remove a candidate in South Carolina from the general election ballot. One wonders if private detectives have been at work in South Carolina, searching for candidates who didn’t file the needed campaign finance forms back in March, yet who hadn’t yet been caught. Thanks to Eugene Platt for the link.

On August 8, two attorneys working for various Republican Party officials filed challenges to the validity of the Libertarian Party statewide petition and the Constitution Party statewide petition. No challenge was filed against the statewide Green Party petition.

Fortunately, also on August 8, Oliver Hall filed a request for injunctive relief in federal court against the Pennsylvania challenge system. That case, which was filed on May 17, 2012, is called Constitution Party v Aichele, eastern district, 5:12-cv-2726. Here is the filing. Here are the exhibits that accompany that filing. Oliver Hall is the attorney for the Constitution, Green, and Libertarian Parties in that case. A previous case filed in 2009 had resulted in a decision that the plaintiffs lack standing. In this instance, it appears logically impossible that anyone could think the Libertarian Party, or the Constitution Party, now lack standing. Without relief from the federal court, the Libertarian and Constitution Parties are placed in the dilemma of either withdrawing their petitions, or risking a judgment that court costs of perhaps $100,000 or more are owed to the challengers.

One of the attorneys who filed the challenge to the Libertarian and Constitution Parties is the same attorney who challenged the minor party statewide petitions in 2010, and who warned the parties that court costs might be as high as $110,000. In 2010 all the statewide minor party petitions were then withdrawn and no one ever determined whether they had enough valid signatures or not.