On January 25, two Wyoming bills to change the law on who can vote in partisan primaries were defeated in the Senate Corporations, Elections and Political Subdivisions Committee. Currently, Wyoming voter registration forms ask the voter to choose a party (or independent status), and neither bill proposed to change that.

SF 96 would have provided that, on primary day, any voter is free to choose any party’s primary ballot, without having to switch his or her party registration. This bill lost 3-2 in the Committee. The two “yes” votes were from one Democrat and one Republican. The three “no” votes were from two Republicans and one Democrat. If this bill had passed, the change would not have been profound, because existing law lets any voter switch parties on primary election day. Wyoming also lets voters register for the first time on primary election day.

SF 13 would have provided that no voter may switch parties in the 60 days before a primary. That bill lost 5-0.

New Hampshire Representative Dan McGuire and several other representatives have introduced HB 240, to let voters cast one vote for as many candidates for any particular office as they wish. This is usually called “Approval Voting.” For instance, if five candidates are running for a particular office and only one is to be elected, and a voter doesn’t particularly care who wins, but that voter is very eager that one particular candidate not be elected, the voter could vote for all four of the other candidates. Thanks to Dale Sheldon-Hess for this news.

Under current Wyoming law, a write-in candidate at the general election can request that write-in votes for him or her be tallied. The request need not be made until two days after the general election. The Wyoming Secretary of State’s omnibus election law bill this year, S20, provides that the Secretary of State can charge a fee for this service. The bill calls it an “administrative fee” and does not set the amount of the fee. It says the amount will be set by rule and regulation.

Courts in three states have already ruled that the U.S. Constitution does not permit states to charge a filing fee for declared write-in candidates. The cases are from the California Supreme Court, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th circuit, and a U.S. District Court in West Virginia. The only permitted rationale for filing fees is to keep ballots from being too crowded. Write-in candidates’ names are never printed on ballot, by definition, so the logic of requiring a filing fee for them doesn’t exist. States are not permitted to charge fees, for either voters or for candidates, merely for the purpose of helping pay for election administration, according to several decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court. For example, in Tashjian v Republican Party of Connecticut, 479 U.S. 208, at page 218, the Court said, “Increases in the cost of administering the election system is not a sufficient basis here for infringing appellees’ First Amendment rights.” In Carrington v Rash, 380 U.S. 89, at 86, the Court said states may not injure voting rights “because of some remote administrative benefit to the state.”