On January 20, the office of the “Repealer”, a Kansas Commission charged with identifying laws that should be repealed because they are unconstitutional or obsolete, submitted a list of 51 laws that ought to be repealed. However, the Repealer did not include Kansas Election laws 25-116 and 25-117, which ban the Communist Party from the ballot.

All such laws were held unconstitutional in 1974 in a unanimous U.S. Supreme Court opinion, Communist Party of Indiana v Whitcomb, 414 U.S. 441. Kansas is one of six states that still bans either the Communist Party, or “subversive” parties, from the ballot, or requires a loyalty oath for parties or candidates. The others are Arizona, Arkansas, California, Illinois and Pennsylvania.

Several years ago, the Kansas Secretary of State tried to persuade the legislature to repeal the Communist Party ban, but the bill to do that was defeated by one vote in committee.

The “Repealer” list in Kansas has received extensive publicity because the list also omits the law banning two individuals of the same sex from having certain kinds of sex. Those laws were declared unconstitutional by a 2003 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court, Lawrence v Texas.

The Mayor of San Luis, Arizona, has filed a lawsuit to remove a candidate for City Council from the ballot if she cannot demonstrate a good command of English. See this story. Arizona state law requires public officials to be able to speak English, but has no details about how well.

On January 20, the minority voter plaintiffs in the Texas redistricting lawsuit (the one that is in 3-judge court in San Antonio) asked for further discovery in the case. The plaintiffs charge that an important e-mail that is relevant to the case was not properly disclosed earlier. The state charges that it did turn over the e-mail months ago, and that the plaintiffs just didn’t notice it. This case is called Perez v State of Texas.

Also on January 20, the San Antonio court set a status conference in the case for February 1, and said it would issue a set of questions for both sides on January 23. The state then asked the court to reconsider the status conference date, and to make it earlier. The state says if the status conference is not held until February 1, it will be impossible to have new districts in place by that date, and then the April 3 primary will need to be postponed again.

Meanwhile, the other Texas redistricting lawsuit, the one being heard in 3-judge U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., is halfway through the trial of whether the legislature’s plan violates the Voting Rights Act. The trial will resume on February 3. The U.S. District Court in San Antonio probably wishes that it could wait for the conclusion of the trial in Washington. If the Washington, D.C. court finds that the legislature’s plan violates the Voting Rights Act, that will give more freedom to the 3-judge court in San Antonio to draw the districts it believes are best.