On October 17, the Missouri Senate convened and considered many amendments to two bills that would have altered the February 7, 2012 presidential primary. In the end, the Senate defeated all the proposed amendments and didn’t pass any bill on this subject. Frontloading HQ has the details here.

Although the February 7 presidential primary will now be held, it will not choose delegates to the Republican national convention. The Missouri Republican Party will use caucuses in March instead. Retaining the February 7 presidential primary will enable the state’s two ballot-qualified minor parties, the Libertarian Party and the Constitution Party, to have their own presidential primaries. UPDATE: here is a newspaper story on the retention of the primary.

On October 17, U.S. District Court Judge Benjamin H. Settle ordered Washington state to release the names and addresses of people who signed the 2009 referendum petition on civil unions for same-sex couples. Here is the 34-page decision in Doe v Reed, 3:09-cv-05456.

The people who circulated Referendum R-71 had originally filed this lawsuit in 2009, hoping to retain privacy for the people who had signed their petition. They had won the first round, in U.S. District Court in 2009, but the Ninth Circuit had then reversed the decision. Then the U.S. Supreme Court heard the case, and ruled that whether the names and addresses should be released depends on whether there is a likelihood that the signers would be harassed if their names were made public. The U.S. District Court then reviewed the evidence and in its October 17, 2011 decision, concluded that the signers have little to fear. The decision reviews the testimony of several people who were on the side of secrecy, and noted that they themselves didn’t seem to have any fear of being publicly identified. The decision also notes that much of the evidence in favor of secrecy was actually not from Washington state at all, but from California, where a somewhat similar ballot measure had been on the ballot in 2008. Finally, the judge noted that a list of people who gave money to support the referendum was already public knowledge, and it didn’t seem that people who had given money for the referendum had been harassed. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link.

On October 17, U.S. District Court Judge Algenon Marbley held a hearing in his chambers in Libertarian Party of Ohio v Husted, and at the conclusion of the meeting, ordered the Ohio Secretary of State to put the Libertarian Party on the ballot in 2012.

Attorneys for Americans Elect, and for the Socialist Party, were present as observers, even though their parties were not parties to the case.

Judge Marbley had ruled on September 7 that the Ohio ballot access laws for new parties could not be enforced in 2012, but the Secretary of State had not then put the Libertarian Party on the ballot. Instead, all he did was write a letter to the legislature, asking the legislature to pass a new law. The legislature did not pass a new law, so the Libertarian Party had then obtained a new hearing, which has now been held. It is unclear whether the legislature will continue to appeal this case. Thanks to Kevin Knedler for this news. UPDATE: here is the one-page order.