Illinois held its 2010 primary on February 2. Although the State Board of Elections hasn’t released the official election returns yet, Green Party activists have collected data from the various counties and have calculated that over 5,501 voters chose a Green Party primary ballot. See the county-by-county breakdown here.

In 2008, the only other year the Green Party had a statewide primary, 3,014 Illinois voters chose a Green Party primary ballot. Before that, no party other than the two major parties had held a statewide primary since 1990 and 1988, when the Illinois Solidarity Party held one. In 1990, only 418 voters had chosen an Illinois Solidarity Party primary ballot, and in 1988, only 525 voters had chosen one.

Before that, there hadn’t been a statewide primary for a party other than the Democratic and Republican Parties since 1926, when the Progressive Party had one.

Attorneys for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts have filed this brief in the First Circuit, in Barr v Galvin. The issue is whether states must let unqualified parties use a stand-in presidential candidate on their ballot access petitions. In 2008 the Libertarian Party won injunctive relief in this case, and in 2009 it won declaratory relief, in the U.S. District Court. The state is appealing.

On February 1, when Delaware’s HB 245 was signed into law, the Green, Constitution, Working Families, and Socialist Workers Parties ceased to be ballot-qualified in Delaware. The law went into effect immediately and set the number of registered voters at approximately 600 members. The old law required approximately 300.

Of course, those parties do have an opportunity to get back on the ballot, by obtaining new registrations between now and August. However, because there is case law that it violates due process for states to increase ballot access requirements in the middle of campaign season, the Delaware Election Commissioner has asked her legal counsel to help her decide whether she should implement the new law immediately, or whether implementation should be postponed until 2011.