Guam currently has the type of open primary that allows a voter to decide, in the secrecy of the voting booth, which party’s primary ballot to use. This system is also used by several states, including Minnesota, Wisconsin, and North Dakota. According to this story, the Guam Election Commission is considering whether to change to the type of open primary at which the voter, while at the polling place on primary election day, must ask for one particular party’s primary ballot.
The Maryland State Board of Elections recently determined that the Independent Party is no longer ballot-qualified, because it has no officers.
The Independent Party became ballot-qualified in 2008. It was formed by supporters of Ralph Nader for president. Nader was an independent presidential candidate in 2008, but Maryland requires more than three times as many signatures for a statewide independent candidate, as for an entire new party. So Nader took the pragmatic path and created the Independent Party, so as to decrease the number of signatures he needed. The Independent Party did not have any candidates for office other than for President in 2008, nor since then. Also, in 2009, the party didn’t file any campaign finance reports.
The State Board of Elections learned that the party’s treasurer had moved to Iowa, and that the party seemed to have no other state officers, so the Board declared the party to be no longer ballot-qualified. Without the Board’s action, the party would probably have continued to be ballot-qualified indefinitely, because Maryland recognizes that a party remains ballot-qualified as long as it continues to have registration of at least 1% of the state total (the state also keeps parties on the ballot as long as they poll 1% of the vote for either Governor or President). The Independent Party has registration of 1.05%, but now that the party is disqualified, the state is sending letters to all the party’s registered members, enclosing a new voter registration form and telling them that if they don’t choose another party, they will automatically be converted to independent voters.
On June 24, the U.S. Supreme Court released an opinion in Doe v Reed, holding that disclosure of the names and addresses of petition signers does not violate the U.S. Constitution. The decision is by Chief Justice John Roberts. The vote was 8-1, with a dissent by Justice Clarence Thomas. The opinion says that if a group that submits a petition can show that the signers are likely to be harassed, then it can bring an as-applied challenge. Here is the opinion.
The Court’s opinion is only 13 pages long. The Thomas dissent is 19 pages long. Justice Alito wrote separately to say the as-applied exception for groups claiming the likelihood of harassment should be granted early in the process. Justice Sotomayor wrote separately to say that the as-applied exception should not be granted easily, and her concurrence was co-signed by Justices Ginsburg and Stevens. Justice Scalia would not sign the Court’s opinion, and wrote separately to say that the U.S. Constitution does not protect secret voting, nor anonymous political speech.
The names and addresses of people who signed the particular referendum petition in this lawsuit will still not be released, until after the case has returned to U.S. District Court to hear the as-applied challenge. The particular referendum in Washington state concerned the civil unions law which the legislature passed in 2008. A referendum petition was filed against that law, and the voters then voted on the civil unions law in November 2008. Voters voted to keep the civil unions law.
On June 23, Delaware HB 425 passed the Senate Administration/Elections Committee. The bill had already passed the House. It reinstates the old, more lenient definition of “Political Party” for 2010 only.
Earlier this year, the legislature had passed a bill doubling the number of registrants that a party needs to be on the ballot, from about 300 members, to about 600. HB 425 says that the new, tougher requirement should not be in force until 2011.
On June 23, U.S. District Court Judge Marcia S. Krieger, a Bush Jr. appointee, upheld Colorado’s law that bars independent candidates (for office other than President) from being on the November ballot if they were a member of an qualified party at any time in the year before the filing deadline. Here is the 25-page opinion.
This means that the two plaintiff-candidates, La Plata County Commissioner Joelle Riddle, and state legislator Kathleen Curry, cannot run for re-election as independent candidates this year unless they run as write-in candidates.
Colorado eased the ballot access restriction this year, but made the change effective next year. Riddle changed her registration from “Democratic” to “independent” on August 21, 2009, and Curry changed her registration from “Democratic” to “independent” on December 28, 2009. The new law, effective 2011, sets the prior affiliation period on January 1 of the election year, so if the new law were effective now, both candidates could be on the ballot this November as independent candidates.
