The December 25 issue of the Durango (Colorado) Herald has this story about Joelle Riddle’s lawsuit against a law that says no one may be an independent candidate if that person has been a member of a qualified party an entire year before filing. Riddle is a County Commissioner who wants to run for re-election as an independent, but the law bars her from getting on the 2010 ballot as an independent because she was a registered Democrat in June 2009.

The article fails to mention that Riddle could, in theory, create a new ballot-qualified party for the entire state of Colorado. That new party, which could perhaps be called the Joelle Riddle Party, is free to pass a bylaw saying that it is willing to nominate any eligible person, regardless of that person’s past partisan affiliation. However, it would take 10,000 signatures to create a new party, although people anywhere in the state could sign. Given the more permissive rules for parties, it seems irrational for Colorado to impose such severe time restrictions on independent candidates.

On December 21, the San Diego County Republican Party, and other plaintiffs, filed a lawsuit in federal court against a San Diego city law that makes it illegal for political parties to contribute to campaigns of candidates running for city office. Here is the 29-page complaint, which also includes 39 pages of exhibits. The case is Thalheimer v City of San Diego, 09-cv-2862, southern district.

All city and county elections in California are non-partisan. However, in 1996 a U.S. District Court in California struck down a state law that made it illegal for political parties to endorse or support candidates in non-partisan elections. The 1996 case was California Democratic Party v Lundgren, 919 F.Supp. 1397.

The new San Diego lawsuit also challenges a ban on a candidate spending or raising money more than a year before the election. The individual candidate-plaintiff, Phil Thalheimer, points out that it is even illegal for him to spend his own money on his own potential campaign for city council in 2012.

For some years, the National Conference of State Legislatures has been keeping a very useful database of bills in state legislatures that amend election laws. Here is a link to that database. One can choose to look at all the election law bills introduced in any single state, in any recent year. Or one can choose to see bills in all states on particular election law subjects, or any combination.

The hard work of finding these bills is mostly handled by Jennie Drage Bowser, with help from Tom Intorcio and Tim Storey, all members of the staff of NCSL. The headquarters of NCSL is in Denver.

The database does not include pre-filed bills. Bills don’t appear on the database until any particular state legislature has convened. Almost all state legislatures will meet in regular session during 2010. Most of them convene the second week of January.