Hawaii Bill to Move Primary Date Advances; Would Take Effect This Year

Posted on by February 5, 2010
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On February 4, the Hawaii House Judiciary Committee passed HB 2397, which moves the primary from the third Saturday in September to the second Saturday in August. The bill takes effect immediately on enactment.

The bill does not change the law that says petitions to qualify a new political party are due 170 days before the primary. Therefore, if the bill passes, the deadline for a new party to submit its petition would move from April 1 to February 21. There are many court precedents that say that states cannot implement earlier petition deadlines for petitions and make that change effective immediately, in the middle of campaign season.

Illinois Governor Asked by Mainstream Press if He Might Resign from Ticket and Run as an Independent

Posted on by February 5, 2010
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The Illinois primary of February 2 featured a 6-candidate race for the Democratic nomination for Lieutenant Governor. The race included four Democratic state legislators and a political newcomer, Scott Lee Cohen. To the surprise of almost everyone, Cohen won the primary with 26.0% of the vote.

Cohen has personal foibles, as described in this Chicago Sun-Times article. In Illinois, candidates for Governor and Lieutenant Governor run as a team in the general election, even though at the primary, the offices are voted on separately. The article also mentions that reporters asked Governor Pat Quinn if he might consider resigning from the Democratic ticket, and run as an independent candidate, so as to free himself from being on a joint ticket with Cohen. The Governor replied, “Let’s take a look at how the situation evolves.” Obviously the Governor is hoping that Cohen will resign from being the Democratic nominee for Lieutenant Governor.

In 1986, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Adlai Stevenson resigned from the Democratic ticket after the primary had produced a situation in which his Lieutenant Governor running mate was otherwise going to be a follower of Lyndon LaRouche. Back then, Stevenson was not permitted to run as an independent candidate because he had already missed the filing deadline, so Stevenson qualified as the nominee of a new party, with an entirely different Lieutenant Governor running mate. The new party was the Illinois Solidarity Party. The Illinois Solidarity Party, with Stevenson as its gubernatorial running mate, polled 40% for Governor. The Democratic party slate that year had no one for Governor and the LaRouche follower for Lieutenant Governor, and that joint slate polled 7%. If the Democratic Party combination of no one for Governor and the LaRouche follower for Lieutenant Governor had polled under 5%, the Democratic Party would have lost its standing as a qualified party for all partisan office in the state. It would have retained its status as a qualified party for most district offices and all statewide offices, but it would have been off the ballot in those districts in which it had not run any nominee, which would have included a large number of legislative districts and partisan county offices.

Nowadays, the independent petition deadline is much later, and Quinn, if he wished, could run as an independent candidate with a new Lieutenant Governor candidate.

First Steps Taken to Place Connecticut Tea Party on the Ballot

Posted on by February 5, 2010
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Dan Gaita of Bethel, Connecticut, has filed paperwork with the Connecticut Secretary of State to use the ballot label “Connecticut Tea Party” for his group. Connecticut has “name protection” for unqualified parties. When a new party organizes in Connecticut, it is free to register its name with the Secretary of State. Then, only candidates associated with that organization can use that label on their petitions and on the November ballot.

No one has yet completed any petitions with “Connecticut Tea Party” as the party label, but presumably some candidates associated with Gaita will now begin petitioning. See this story. Thanks to Bill Van Allen for the link.

Georgia Bill to Expand Ballot Access and Permit Partial Fusion

Posted on by February 5, 2010
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Senator David Shafer (R-Duluth) has introduced SB 359, which improves ballot access for parties that have already attained qualified status for statewide office, and also partially legalizes fusion.

The biggest change made by the bill is that it expands ballot access to all partisan office, for parties that are in the present situation of the Libertarian Party. The Libertarian Party is ballot-qualified for the statewide offices as long as it continues to poll 1% for any statewide nominee (technically, the 1% is 1% of the number of registered voters, not 1% of the vote cast in that race, so the vote test more accurately is a 1.5% vote test). The Libertarian Party got statewide status in 1988, when it completed a petition of 1% of the number of registered voters.

The bill says that such statewide parties would now be ballot-qualified for all offices, not just the statewide offices. If the bill passed, the Libertarian Party could run candidates for all partisan offices with no petition. Of course this change would help other minor parties in the future, if they could just complete the 1% statewide petition. Other parties that have managed to complete the 1% petition, in the past, have been the New Alliance Party and the Reform Party. However, the 1% statewide petition is tough, and the Green Party, the Natural Law Party, and the Constitution Party, have never managed to comply with it. The 1% petition procedure was passed by the legislature in 1986.

The bill also says that fusion would be permitted between a major qualified party (one that had polled over 20% of the vote for Governor or President) and a qualified minor party (one that had polled over 1%, but under 20%). Oddly enough, though, the bill would not legalize fusion between two qualified minor parties, nor would it legalize fusion between two major parties, nor would it permit fusion involving an independent candidate. Thanks to Bryan Sells, and also Bill Van Allen, for this news.

Senator Shafer has been a State Senator since 2002. In the 1990’s, he was Executive Director of the Republican Party. He is an influential Senator, and Republicans have a majority in both houses of the legislature and hold the Governorship.

U.S. District Court Judge Says Plaintiffs in Montana Ballot Access Case Lack Standing

Posted on by February 5, 2010
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On February 3, U.S. District Court Judge Sam Haddon issued an opinion in Kelly v Johnson, cv-08-25, the case filed in 2008 against Montana’s ballot access laws for independent candidates for office other than President. The judge ruled that neither the candidate-plaintiff, nor the voter-plaintiff, have standing to challenge that ballot access law. The plaintiff, Steve Kelly, will appeal.

The opinion is only 7 pages. It says that because the candidate-plaintiff had not made a certain decision to run for U.S. Senate in Montana on the date he filed his complaint (April 8, 2008), therefore he lacks standing. And the voter-plaintiff lacks standing because she said she wanted to vote for Kelly, whom the judge characterized as a non-candidate. UPDATE: it turns out that the judge’s conclusion that Kelly had not decided whether to run when he filed the complaint is not factually accurate. The quotation from Kelly’s statement on the witness stand does not really say what the judge said he said. Also, Kelly’s verified complaint, under oath, says he had decided to run.

The decision cites many cases on standing, but none of them are ballot access cases. The decision does not mention the U.S. Supreme Court opinion Burdick v Takushi, in which a voter challenged Hawaii’s ban on write-in voting and never named any particular candidate he wanted to cast a write-in vote for. The decision also does not mention Erum v Cayetano, a 1989 decision of the 9th circuit in which the plaintiff challenged a ballot access law in Hawaii. Although the plaintiff in that case, Ted Erum, lost the case, the 9th circuit said he had standing. It said, “The Lieutenant Governor contends that Erum lacks standing to challenge the 10% reqirement of section 12-41 because it did not come into play to exclude him in his 1984 bid to gain access to the general election ballot. But Erum brought this action in his capacity as a registered voter of the State of Hawaii as well in his capacity as an erstwhile and potentially future candidate. Candidate eligibility requirements implicate basic constitutional rights of voters as well as those of candidates. Erum possesses standing to challenge the whole of section 12-41’s ballot access restrictions in his capacity as a registered voter.”

Montana is in the 9th circuit, so the Erum controls. The judge knew about the Erum precedent but he chose not to mention it in his opinion.

The Montana case challenges the March petition deadline for independent candidate petitions (for office other than president), and the number of signatures, 5% of the winning candidate’s vote in the last election for that office. Judge Haddon has a reputation for virtually always ruling in favor of the government in any cases before him in which an individual is challenging a government policy or a law.