According to this story, leaders of the New York state Independence Party may soon be compelled to answer questions about a donation to the party in 2009 amounting to over $1,000,000. Thanks to Bill Van Allen for the link.
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On June 11, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said he could not have won a semi-closed Republican gubernatorial primary. See this story. Actually, according to exit polls in the special gubernatorial election of October 2003, 74% of registered Republicans voted for him in that special election.
In a related vein, supporters of Proposition 14 said during the campaign, over and over, that Republican primaries in California always result in victories for extreme conservatives. However, in all the contested Republican statewide primaries this year, with a semi-closed system, the more conservative candidate (among those who had big campaigns) lost in each instance. Steve Poizner lost for Governor, Sam Aanestad lost for Lieutenant Governor, Orly Taitz lost for Secretary of State, Tom Harman lost for Attorney General, and Chuck Devore lost for U.S. Senator.
Mimi Marziani, a fellow with the Brennan Center, has this article saying that programs for public funding for candidates are worthwhile, whether they have extra public funds for publicly-funded candidates with high-spending privately-funded opponents or not.
This topic is relevant because the U.S. Supreme Court recently put a temporary hold on the part of Arizona public funding that furnishes extra public funding in those circumstances. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link.
On June 10, the Delaware House unanimously passed HB 425. The bill says that for 2010 only, the number of registrants for a party to be ballot-qualified should be one-twentieth of 1%, not one-tenth of 1%.
Earlier this year, the legislature had increased the requirement from one-twentieth of 1% to one-tenth of 1%, effective immediately. Most of Delaware’s ballot-qualified minor parties then did a good job of complaining that it is not fair to stiffen the requirements in an election year and make it effective immediately. Both the minor parties injured by the new law, and the minor parties not injured by the new law, worked together. The Independent Party of Delaware was especially helpful. They persuaded the Election Commissioner to ask the legislature to pass HB 425. The bill now goes to the Senate. Thanks to Bill Van Allen for this news.
On June 11, the South Dakota Constitution Party filed a federal lawsuit against a South Dakota election law that requires members of small qualified parties to submit 250 signatures of party members in order to get on their own party’s primary ballot for statewide office. The case is called Constitution Party of South Dakota v Nelson, cv10-3011. The lawsuit also challenges the ban on out-of-state circulators. Here is the eleven-page complaint.
The Constitution Party is the only ballot-qualified party in South Dakota, other than the Democratic and Republican Parties. It became a qualified party in 2008, by submitting 8,389 valid signatures. Parties that qualify in presidential years in South Dakota are also automatically on in the following gubernatorial election year. The Constitution Party only has 345 registered voters in the state. The candidates seeking a place on this year’s primary ballot for statewide office made a strong effort, and did submit petitions bearing the signatures of over 100 party members by the March deadline, but those petitions were rejected, because the law requires 250 signatures of party members.
Statewide candidates of the Libertarian Party had had a similar problem in 2000 in South Dakota, when they also couldn’t get the signatures of 250 party members in order to get on the Libertarian primary ballot. They filed a federal lawsuit in 2000, and the case won, but it was won on statutory construction grounds, not constitutional grounds. The judge interpreted the law to mean that the Libertarians in 2000 didn’t really need 250 signatures of party members. However, in 2007, the South Dakota legislature amended the law, to make it clear that the 250-signature requirement does apply.
If the Constitution Party wins its new lawsuit, that will be a useful precedent that states must make the number of signatures needed for primary ballot access proportionate to the number of voters registered in that particular party, if the state insists that only registered party members may sign. The precedent might be useful against a somewhat similar requirement in Maine. The precedent would probably have less bearing on Massachusetts, another state that doesn’t make the number of signatures proportionate to the size of the party, because Massachusetts lets independent voters sign primary petitions, and over half of Massachusetts registered voters are independents.