Maine Representative Ben Chipman (I-Portland) has introduced LD 142, to remove the requirement that a qualified party, or a group attempting to qualify as a political party, must hold a municipal caucus in at least one town in each county in the state. Ballot access requirements that require support from each county in a state, or even support from any particular number of counties, have been held unconstitutional. Illinois, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Rhode Island, Texas, Utah, Wisconsin, and Wyoming, all had ballot access requirements in the past that required support from a certain number of counties, but none of those laws exist any longer. Nebraska still has a county distribution requirement for non-presidential statewide independent candidates, passed in 2007, but that law is under attack in U.S. District Court. Nebraska’s county distribution requirement for petitions for a new party was held unconstitutional in 1984.
Maine has 16 counties, ranging in population from 17,000 (Piscataquis County) to 278,000 (Cumberland County).