The Boston Globe has this article about Americans Elect, which contains a serious misstatement of fact about ballot access laws. The story says 22 states do not permit a new political party to start petitioning, registration drives, or other tasks involving getting on the ballot until January 1 of the election year. Actually, there are only nine states that do not permit ballot access work for a new party to begin until the election year.

The nine states are Connecticut, Illinois, Iowa, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin. What is most disappointing about the article is that it even misrepresents Massachusetts election law. The only method for a group to transform itself into a qualified party before any given election in Massachusetts is for it to persuade 1% of the state’s registered voters to enroll into that group, on voter registration forms. This route to the ballot has existed since 1990, and it is so difficult, it has never been used. It requires all these registered voters by November of the odd year before the election. This is one of two state ballot access requirements that is so difficult, even Americans Elect isn’t attempting it. Obviously, since Massachusetts requires the group to get approximately 40,000 registered members by November 11, 2011, the registration drive must be accomplished in the odd year before the election year. Yet the Boston Globe story says Massachusetts is a state that “does not allow the process to begin until after the year of the general election.”

Massachusetts also has procedures to get independent candidates on the November ballot by petition, but the petition must contain the name of a candidate. The Massachusetts policy on whether stand-ins are permitted on this petition is hopelessly murky. The Secretary of State permitted it in 1980, 1996, 2000, and 2004, but refused in 2008.

This Newsweek story on Americans Elect is more informative than many press stories on Americans Elect. The reporter, Andrew Romano, interviewed more people, and got information that has not previously been in print.

Elliot Ackerman, one of the group’s main leaders, seems intrigued by the possibility that even if Americans Elect’s nominee doesn’t win the general election, that the group will active in the 2014 and 2016 elections. For the record, if the Americans Elect presidential nominee in 2012 gets 5% of the vote for President in every state (as the Reform Party did in 1996), it will automatically be a qualified party for all statewide partisan office, in 2014, in Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Washington, and Wisconsin. Its 2014 status in a few of these states depends on its having a certain number of registered voters in those particular states, in addition or instead of having polled 5% for President.

The Indiana Daily Student, of Bloomington, is one of the oldest and best-known college newspapers in the nation. The November 14 issue has this op-ed condemning Indiana’s ballot access laws for minor party and independent candidates.

Among all the states with restrictive ballot access laws, there is probably less agitation to improve these laws in Indiana than any other state. Perhaps this op-ed can do something to start activity in Indiana for ballot access reform. Indiana legislators have the earliest deadline for submitting normal bills into the legislature of any state. Any Indiana legislator who wishes to introduce a ballot access reform bill must introduce it before the end of 2011, if it is to be considered in the normal process during 2012.