The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has this article about the effort to collect 44,089 valid signatures to get Brad Bryant on the Georgia ballot as a candidate for State School Superintendent.  If he succeeds, he will be the first independent candidate in Georgia history to qualify for statewide office by petition, except for certain independent presidential candidates.

Georgia has required independents to collect signatures starting in 1943.  Between 1943 and 1979, the statewide independent requirement was 5% of the number of registered voters.  Between 1979 and 1986, it was 2.5% of registered voters.  Since 1986 it has been 1%.  Even at the 1% level, no independent statewide petition has succeeded for any office other than President.  Georgia has severe requirements for getting petitions circulated.  Each sheet must be notarized.  Signers must not only sign their names, print their names, print their addresses, but must enter the county and the date of signing.  If any notary public submits any signatures in his or her capacity as a circulator, then all of that notary public’s work in the capacity as a notary is invalid.

Independent presidential candidates who complied with the 1% petition requirement, in the years that requirement was set at 1%, are Ross Perot in 1992, and Pat Buchanan in 2000.  Georgia is one of four states in which Ralph Nader never appeared on the ballot (the others are Indiana, North Carolina, and Oklahoma).  Thanks to Faye Coffield for the link.

On July 8, a 3-judge U.S. District Court in the Northern District of Mississippi ruled that the U.S. Constitution does not require a larger number of members in the U.S. House of Representatives.  Clemons v U.S. Department of Commerce, 3:09-cv-104.  The decision is 36 pages long.

Plaintiffs had based on their argument on the need to have approximately equal representation in the U.S. House.  Given that the size of the House is 435 members, and given that the Constitution implicitly seems to bar creating U.S. House districts that include parts of one state and parts of another state, the existing system provides great inequality between states.  Wyoming has one seat for 495,304 persons, but Montana has one seat for 905,316 persons.  Therefore, an individual voter in Wyoming has more than twice the voting power of a voter in Montana, for U.S. House representation.

The decision says that the Constitution was almost amended in the 1790’s to provide for an ever-increasing size in the U.S. House.  The proposed amendment to require that Congress constantly increase the size of the U.S. House passed in Congress and would have become part of the Constitution if one more state had ratified it.  In effect, the recent decision says that the courts should not impose an idea that might have become part of the text of the Constitution itself, but did not become part of the Constitution.  Thanks to Michael Warnken for the news.  The case will almost certainly be appealed directly to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Although the Wisconsin Green Party is one of the oldest state Green Parties in the U.S., it has never run a candidate for Assembly in Madison, Wisconsin (in Wisconsin, as in New York and California, the lower house of the legislature is called the Assembly).  However, Ben Manski recently declared his intention to run for the 77th district seat as a Green Party nominee.

The 77th district has been represented since 1984 by Spencer Black, who is the leader of the Democrats in the Assembly, but he is retiring.  Already, before Manski announced, the race was getting publicity because open legislative seats are so rare in Madison.  See this story.  Thanks to Green Party Watch for the news about Manski.  Here is the wiki article about Ben Manski.