On February 26, the U.S. Supreme Court asked Massachusetts to respond to the cert petition in Simmons v Galvin, 09-559. Generally, if one side asks the Court to hear a case, and the other side doesn’t bother to respond, the Court will ask the other side to file a response if the Court is somewhat interested in the case. The issue in Simmons v Galvin is whether the federal Voting Rights Act has any relevance to state laws that prevent ex-felons and felons from registering to vote. Thanks to Rick Hasen for this news.

The U.S. Supreme Court seems quite interested in election law this year. It has already taken one election law case, Doe v Reed, on petition privacy. It also seems interested in Citizens for Police Accountability v Browning, the Florida case on petitioning at the polls.

On March 10, at 9 a.m., a California Superior Court in Sacramento will hear arguments in Fuller v Bowen, 34-2010-80000452. This is the case on whether the California Constitution’s provision, requiring candidates for the legislature to have lived in the district at least one year before the election, is still valid under the U.S. Constitution. The case was filed by a Republican candidate for State Senate, to prevent the Secretary of State from certifying one of her opponents for the June 2010 primary ballot, on the grounds that the opponent moved into the district in December 2009, less than a year before the 2010 election. The candidate who filed the case is Heidi Fuller; the opponent is Assemblymember Tom Berryhill.

Another California election law case will be heard on March 12, Friday, at 1:30 pm, also in Sacramento Superior Court. That case is Clark v Bowen, 34-2010-80000460, over how Proposition 14, the “top-two open primary” measure, should be described on the June 2010 ballot. Here is the plaintiff’s brief.