Elliot Ackerman, chief operating officer of Americans Elect, will be interviewed by Stephen Colbert on Comedy Central, 11:30 pm eastern time, on August 10, Wednesday. Thanks to Alex Hammer for this news.
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On August 9, the 8th circuit upheld the Arkansas vote test for a party to remain on the ballot. The decision is Green Party of Arkansas v Martin, 10-3106. Arkansas requires a party to poll 3% for the office at the top of the ballot in each election, in order to stay on the ballot (i.e., 3% for President in presidential years, and 3% for Governor in midterm years).
The outcome was not too surprising. No federal court has ever struck down any state’s vote test for remaining on the ballot. Generally federal courts feel that if the requirements to get a newly-qualifying party on the ballot are reasonable, states are free to dump them off the ballot after any particular election. The only winning case on this issue came in 1983 from the Alaska Supreme Court, which in Vogler v Miller struck down the old law requiring a party to poll 10% for Governor to remain on the ballot.
The Arkansas decision says “at least sixteen states” have vote tests that relate to a specific office, and footnote eleven lists them. The statement and the footnote are in error; Arizona, Alaska, Maryland and Wyoming do not belong on the list. Alaska, Arizona. and Maryland have alternate registration tests, and Wyoming permits the vote test to be satisfied by any of three different statewide offices.
The Green Party expects to start its petition for 2012 ballot access after Labor Day. It must get 10,000 valid signatures within the 90-day window that it chooses for itself, so the signatures will be due in early December 2011.
On August 8, an Arizona Superior Court held a two-hour hearing over whether the recall petition against State Senate President Russell Pearce is valid. See this story. Senator Pearce argues that all of the signatures are invalid, because of various aspects of the petition’s wording.
Ballot Access News
July 1, 2011 – Volume 27, Number 2
| This issue was originally printed on cream paper. |
Table of Contents
- THREE STATES REINSTATE EARLY PETITION DEADLINES THAT HAD BEEN THROWN OUT IN COURT EARLIER
- U.S. SUPREME COURT REFUSES TO HEAR CONNECTICUT PUBLIC FUNDING CASE
- MARYLAND COURT PUTS LIBERTARIANS, GREENS ON BALLOT
- OTHER BALLOT ACCESS BILLS
- LAWSUIT NEWS
- STRAIGHT TICKET DEVICES DECLINE
- SOUTH DAKOTA OUT-OF-STATE CIRCULATORS
- NATIONAL POPULAR VOTE BILLS
- 2012 PETITIONING FOR PRESIDENT
- MINOR PARTIES POLLED 25% IN NEW YORK U.S. HOUSE SPECIAL ELECTION
- AMERICANS ELECT BALLOT LOGO
- PROHIBITION PARTY NOMINATES
- NEW PARTY QUALIFIES FOR WEST VIRGINIA BALLOT IN SPECIAL ELECTION
- JOHN HOSPERS DIES
- MINOR PARTY NOMINEES IN 2011 LEGISLATIVE ELECTIONS
- 2012 PETITIONING
- SUBSCRIBING TO BAN WITH PAYPAL
Michael Lind has this essay at Salon. He suggests that proportional representation would be good for the United States, but then concludes that a nation that still hasn’t switched wholly to the metric system is unlikely to switch to proportional representation either.
The essay also says that the U.S. needs more than new ideas; it needs a whole new social movement, embodying ideas that have not yet crystallized.