On February 10, the Connecticut Secretary of State announced that Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul, Mitt Romney, and Rick Santorum are on the ballot automatically for the April 24 Republican presidential primary. The Connecticut law says the Secretary of State is supposed to list candidates if “the candidacy of such person for such party’s nomination for president is generally and seriously advocated or recognized according to reports in the national or state news media.”

California and many other states have similar laws, but in California, the Secretary of State recognized Buddy Roemer and Fred Karger as Republican presidential candidates who meet the media test. The difference between the Connecticut list, and the California list, shows how arbitrary these “media” laws are.

This Connecticut news story says that Buddy Roemer asked to be included on the Connecticut ballot, and that his communication was 40 minutes too late. However, nothing in the Connecticut law says or implies that a candidate needs to communicate with the Secretary of State. Also, the reporter seemed to have accepted the Secretary of State’s claim that anyone not included should have no trouble completing the alternate petition procedure, which requires the signatures of 1% of a party’s registrants. In reality that alternative procedure is so difficult, no one in Connecticut has ever completed it. Unlike the Virginia and Indiana presidential primary petitions, the Connecticut petitions can only be signed by registered members of the party, and the time to obtain the signatures is very short. Thanks to Bill Van Allen for the link.

On February 10, the Libertarian Party submitted approximately 12,000 signatures to become a qualified party in South Dakota. The legal requirement is 7,928. This is the first petition that the Libertarian Party has submitted in any state since June 2011, when it turned in its Arkansas petition. However, recently the party has been turning in signatures on its New Hampshire petition to the towns on a piece-meal basis. Other Libertarian Party petitions that are over half finished are the North Dakota and Oklahoma petitions.

The South Dakota Libertarian Party had previously completed party petitions in 1994, 2000, and 2004. A party that turns in a South Dakota party petition in a presidential year is automatically on the ballot for the next two elections. But when a party goes through a gubernatorial election and fails to poll as much as 2.5% for Governor, it is removed from the ballot, although it retains its registrants. The only time the South Dakota Libertarian Party ever met the vote test for Governor was in 1994.

Americans Elect and the Constitution Party are also petitioning for party status in South Dakota this year. If both qualify, South Dakota will have five qualified parties on the 2012 ballot, the most qualified parties in South Dakota since the 1910’s decade. The Green Party has never been ballot-qualified in South Dakota.

The Illinois Green Party is holding its own presidential primary on the internet, for members of the party. People are permitted to join the party on the same day they vote in the party’s presidential primary. Here is a link to the process.