November 22 was the deadline for candidates for Mayor of Chicago to file petitions.  The city requires 12,500 valid signatures.  The race is non-partisan.  Because no incumbent is running, there are far more candidates than normal.  It appears that eleven candidates submitted petitions, although it is too early to know how many of them have at least 12,500 signatures.  Under Illinois law, a petition is deemed to be valid, even if it has only one signature, if no one challenges it.

The Chicago election is on February 22, 2011.  Chicago requires far more signatures to run for Mayor than any other city in the United States.  The new, lower petition requirement to run for Mayor of New York city is 3,750, whether the candidate is running in a party primary or petitioning directly for the general election.

On November 19, Citizens Action filed a lawsuit in the West Virginia Supreme Court, hoping to get a ruling that the state must hold a special gubernatorial election in the first half of 2011.  Joe Manchin resigned from being Governor recently because he had been elected in the middle of his 4-year term to the U.S. Senate.  The State Constitution requires a special election when the governorship becomes empty when there is at least one year to go in the term.  But it doesn’t say when the special election should be.  See this story.

Although the story mentions that the Republican Party backs this lawsuit, Citizens Action is more closely associated with the Mountain Party than it is with conservative groups.  If there is no special election, the President of the State Senate will serve as acting Governor until the end of 2012.

Alaska registration forms list not only the qualified parties, but also parties that have filed a request to be listed on the form so that they may possibly get enough registered members to become ballot-qualified.  The Constitution Party recently filed the paperwork to be listed on Alaska registration forms.

The only ballot-qualified parties in Alaska currently, besides the Democratic and Republican Parties, are the Libertarian and Alaskan Independence Parties.  Thanks to ThirdPartyDaily for this news.  Other unqualified parties now listed on the Alaska registration form are the Green, Veterans, and Republican Moderate Parties.  None of those last-named three parties seem to be active in Alaska anymore, and their registration numbers have been slowly declining for the last six years.