On January 27, the New Jersey Supreme Court heard arguments in In re: Contest of November 8, 2011 Election, no. 58-11. The issue is whether Gabriela Mosquera, the Democratic nominee in the 4th district, should be seated in the Assembly. She was elected to the Assembly last year, and afterwards her opponent challenged her qualifications. Mosquera admits she has not lived in the district for a full year before the election. Ironically, she has now lived in the district for a full year, so if the Court rules that the election should be annulled, but if it also rules that the Democratic Party may name a replacement, the Democratic Party intends to choose her for the vacancy.

New Jersey does not hold special elections for legislative vacancies. The party that won the last election for a particular seat is entitled to choose a replacement. See this story about the hearing, which seems to indicate that there are some Justices who feel strongly one way, and other Justices who feel strongly the other way, and some Justices who didn’t give a clue as to their thoughts.

As an aside which has nothing to do with the controversy, Mosquera is a naturalized U.S. citizen who was born in Ecuador.

Currently, Arizona provides for public funding of campaigns, whereas for most offices, New Mexico does not.

In the New Mexico legislature, Senator Eric Griego has introduced SB 105, to establish public funding for all partisan state offices. The bill does not discriminate for or against any candidate on the basis of party affiliation or lack of party affiliation.

In Arizona, SCR 1021 and SB 1138 would end public funding of campaigns. Supporters of Arizona’s public funding recently succeeded in persuading the Senate Judiciary Committee to postpone a hearing on SCR 1021. It had been on the committee agenda for January 30, but it has been taken off the agenda and will probably be brought up at hearing next month.

On January 26, the Utah House passed HB 50, which ends the listing of political parties on the state income tax form. The purpose of listing the parties on the state income tax form is to enable taxpayers to choose to send $2 to the political party of their choice. The vote to repeal that program was 51-20. Fifteen of the seventeen Democrats in the House opposed the bill, but only five Republicans opposed it. The five Republicans who opposed ending the program are Representatives Edwards, Last, Nielson, Pitcher, and Powell.

According to this story, the bill’s sponsor, Representative John Dougall (R-American Forks) is motivated not because there is anything intrinsically wrong with the program, but because he favors keeping the system by which parties nominate candidates in Utah. Utah is the only state in which no one can get on a primary ballot unless the candidate first receives a substantial vote at a party convention. That system is under constant attack. Dougall thinks that it is easier to defend the convention system if the income tax option is eliminated. He says then it will be easier to argue that political parties are entirely private entities. However, he is not proposing to end taxpayer funding for party primaries.

The Democratic Party reived $32,886 from the program last year; the Republican Party received $46,276; Libertarians received $3,282; the Constitution Party received $3,060. Utah is one of the few states with a substantial budget surplus.