This year, the ballot-qualified Arizona Green Party, which is required under state law to nominate by primary, has in influx of candidates who are apparently not bona fide Greens, and who have refused to meet with Green Party activists and leaders.  There is evidence that political consultants who are associated with Republicans recruited these candidates.  See this blog post.

In 1951, the National Municipal League, which is now called the National Civic League, published a booklet, “A Model Direct Primary System.”  It was written by Dr. Joseph P. Harris, at that time the nation’s leading authority on election administration.  His book says that states should let qualified small parties nominate by convention, not primary.  The book says primaries for small qualified parties is a waste of taxpayer money.  Furthermore, as this 2010 incident shows, small qualified parties themselves are better off if state law permits them to nominate by convention.  If Arizona let the Green Party nominate by convention, the party wouldn’t be having this problem.

August 23 is the deadline for petitions for independent candidates, and the nominees of unqualified parties, for U.S. Senate in West Virginia.  The only candidate who attempted to qualify by petition is Jeff Becker of the Constitution Party.  It will be several weeks before the state can check the petition to see if he has the required 1,756 valid signatures.

If Becker’s petition succeeds, there will be four candidates on the November 2010 ballot for U.S. Senate.  The three ballot- qualified parties have nominees that are being chosen in the August 24 special primary.  Those three parties are Democratic, Mountain, and Republican.  The Mountain Party is an affiliate of the Green Party.

In other Mountain Party news, the party lost one of its four candidates for the legislature.  At the regularly-scheduled May 11, 2010 primary, Robert Bryan Mills was on the Mountain Party primary ballot for House of Delegates, 51st district.  He received zero votes in the primary.  The Secretary of State has ruled that candidates cannot be deemed nominated, even if they were unopposed, unless they get at least one vote.  Mills would have voted for himself but on primary election day, he had car trouble and couldn’t get to the polls.  He lives in a rural area.

Missouri held primaries on August 3 for the Constitution, Democratic, Libertarian and Republican Parties.  Missouri does not have registration by party, and voters are free to choose any party’s primary ballot.

At least 3,529 voters chose to vote in the 2010 Libertarian primary.  That is party’s second-best primary showing in Missouri history.  By contrast, in the August 2008 primary in Missouri, only 1,729 voters had chosen the Libertarian primary ballot, and in March 2008, only 2,057 had chosen the Libertarian presidential primary ballot.  Libertarians have had their own primary in Missouri in all elections starting in 1990.

The 2010 Constitution Party primary attracted at least 1,884 voters.  That is the best Constitution Party primary turnout in Missouri history.  The Constitution Party also had a primary in Missouri in 1998 and 2000.

At the 2010 primaries, the Libertarian Party nominated for both statewide offices, for eight of the nine U.S. House seats, for two State Senate seats, and for ten State House seats.  The Constitution Party nominated for one statewide race, three U.S. House seats, two State Senate seats, and eighteen State House seats.