The Iowa Constitution says that judges “shall at such judicial election stand for retention for office on a separate ballot which shall submit the question of whether such judges shall be retained in office for the tenure prescribed for such office…”.  Iowa held its normal judicial retention election on November 2, 2010, and the voters voted not to retain the three State Supreme Court justices whose names were on the ballot.

On December 13, three attorneys filed a lawsuit in lower state court, alleging that the judicial retention election was illegal, because the judicial retention question was not on a separate ballot.  Instead, it was on the same ballot that every other office was on.  The November 2010 Iowa ballot listed U.S. Senate, U.S. House, the statewide state offices, the legislative contests, the county partisan contests, on the front.  On the back it had non-partisan offices and the judicial retention section, and then a statewide question on amending the state Constitution.  The case is George v Mauro, Polk Co. dist. ct., ce67313.  A hearing is set for December 20.  Here is the paperwork filed with the court.

The Supreme Court justices had been defeated for retention after an election campaign which criticized them for being part of the unanimous decision that legalized same-sex marriages.

On May 19, 2009, a very significant case was argued in the 2nd circuit, over the right to circulate a petition.  Almost 19 months have passed, and still there is no opinion.  The case is Maslow v Board of Elections in the City of New York, 08-3075-cv.  The issue is a New York state law that makes it illegal for anyone to circulate a petition to get someone on a primary ballot, unless the circulator is a registered member of the same party.

Primary ballot access in New York state is more difficult than it is in most states.  Virtually everyone who runs for office in a partisan primary in that state must submit a hefty number of petition signatures.  The significant exceptions are presidential candidates in the Republican primary, and candidates for other statewide office who have substantial support at party endorsement conventions.

The requirement that the circulator must be in the same party as the candidate is especially serious, because of another New York law that makes it impossible for people to switch their membership from one party to another, and have that change take effect immediately.  Instead they must wait approximately nine months to have the switch take effect.

The state defends the law by saying that parties have a right to exclude outsiders from their nomination process.  But the plaintiffs argue that it is the primary voters who choose the party nominees, and the party interest in letting only members determine their nominees is thereby satisfied.  The plaintiffs argue that no principle justifies preventing non-members of a party from helping a party member with his or her campaign in advance of the actual party decision.  Plaintiffs say, if this restriction can stand, that would also justify forbidding candidates in a primary from letting non-members donate, or distribute leaflets, or serve as campaign treasurers or as attorneys or consultants to a campaign.  Here is the brief of the people who brought the lawsuit.  One of the plaintiffs wanted to circulate petitions for her sister, but the law forbade it.

New York Times writer Matt Bai has this interesting article about Mayor Michael Bloomberg.  The article is triggered by Bloomberg’s appearance on December 13 at the “No Labels” meeting in Washington, D.C.  Bai suggests that Bloomberg still may decide to run for President as an independent, and that he can wait until the 2012 primaries.  This is accurate, generally.  All states have independent presidential petition deadlines that are in July, August and September, except for a handful in June, and the deviant Texas deadline in May.  The Texas deadline is almost certainly unconstitutional.

Bai’s generalization that the internet has made petitioning easier is questionable.  Many states still have laws and regulations that make it impossible for supporters to download and print blank petition forms on their home computers and printers.  Some states require that all signatures be gathered on state-printed forms.  Other states permit photocopies but require that they be on legal size paper.  No state except Utah permits signatures to be obtained electronically, and most New England states still have the cumbersome procedure that signatures must be submitted to each town clerk, and then gathered up by the petitioning candidate or group and then taken to the state elections office.  Another big problem is that only a handful of states require that shopping malls permit petitioners on their property, and even the government-owned post office still forbids petitioning on its interior sidewalks (although the Postal Service regulation is being contested in court).

Salon editor Steve Kornacki has this reaction to Bai’s article.  Kornacki criticizes Bai for implying that an independent presidential candidacy is something that has only been possible in the internet age, and points out that Ross Perot’s independent run in 1992 was before the internet age.