On November 16, the independent candidate who is challenging North Carolina’s petition requirements for independent U.S. House candidates filed this brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals, 4th circuit.  The law requires a petition signed by 4% of the number of registered voters.  No independent candidate has ever appeared on a North Carolina government-printed ballot for that office.  However, the U.S. District Court upheld the law because it is believed that an independent candidate petition did succeed this year.  However, the petition was for a candidate who then refused to run.  The petition had been sponsored by the Service Employees International Union, which has a great deal of resources and which probably spent between $50,000 and $100,000 on the drive.

Mike DeBonis, a Washington Post columnist, uses his column to explore the idea that the District of Columbia should use all-mail voting to fill a vacancy in the Washington city council.  See his column here.  He promotes the idea as a way to save tax dollars.

On November 2, U.S. District Court Judge Philip S. Gutierrez issued a 6-page ruling, declining to strike down some of California’s residency requirements for petitioners, on the grounds that the state says it doesn’t enforce those laws anyway.  The judge gave the plaintiffs until November 23 to amend their complaint, but to prevail, the plaintiffs must find anyone who was ever told that he or she can’t circulate outside his or her home district, or some candidate who was told that.  Also if anyone ever submitted any petitions that were rejected because of the out-of-district law, that person could also be added to the complaint.

The case is Libertarian Party of Los Angeles County v Bowen, central district, cv10-2488.  When the same issue arose in early 2010 for the Green Party of Arizona’s lawsuit on this same point, the judge in the Arizona case ruled that even though Arizona made the same defense (that it wouldn’t enforce the law), that did not save the law from being declared unconstitutional.  The problem with a state saying that it won’t enforce the law is that most people won’t know that.  There is no notice on any California official web page that says the residency requirement for candidate petitions is not enforced.  The petition form forces people to sign a statement that says they are residents of the district.