North Carolina has three constitutional ballot access lawsuits pending. One is in the State Supreme Court, and concerns the rules for new and previously unqualified parties to get on the ballot, as well as other issues such as the ability of voters to register into unqualified parties, and whether a party should be able to get on the ballot in just part of the state if it isn’t on statewide. This case is 5 years old.
Also, there is the case filed in 2008 against the independent candidate procedures for U.S. House, which are so strict, they have never been used, in the 109 years North Carolina has had government-printed ballots.
Finally, there is the February 2010 lawsuit, which raises an issue that has not been raised anywhere in the U.S. in a lawsuit, until now. This new case argues that if an independent candidate ran in the immediately preceding election, and now is running again, that same candidate should not need a second petition, if his or her vote total in the earlier election was significant. See this story about that lawsuit. The story, toward the end, erroneously says Brody is one of only two independent candidates who has ever been on a government-printed ballot. That is not correct. Ross Perot got on as an independent presidential candidate, and about 7 or 8 independent candidates for the legislature have been on in the last twenty years.
