New York State To Choose Between Two Types of Optical Scan Vote-Counting Machines

Posted on by December 24, 2009
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On December 15, the New York State Board of Elections said that the state will soon buy optical-scan vote-counting machines. Still to be decided is whether Election Systems & Softward (ES&S) of Omaha, or Dominion Voting Systems of Toronto, will get the contracts. See this TV news story, concerning the process in New York city.

Voters will electronically mark their paper ballots, which are then read by the vote-counting equipment. There is a paper trail. New York in 2008 was the only state still using mechanical voting machines, which were invented in 1892 and provide that voters pull levers to indicate which candidate is being voted for. There is no paper trail with mechanical voting machines.

Republican Party Sues to Overturn San Diego Law Making it Illegal for Parties to Contribute to Candidates for City Office

Posted on by December 24, 2009
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On December 21, the San Diego County Republican Party, and other plaintiffs, filed a lawsuit in federal court against a San Diego city law that makes it illegal for political parties to contribute to campaigns of candidates running for city office. Here is the 29-page complaint, which also includes 39 pages of exhibits. The case is Thalheimer v City of San Diego, 09-cv-2862, southern district.

All city and county elections in California are non-partisan. However, in 1996 a U.S. District Court in California struck down a state law that made it illegal for political parties to endorse or support candidates in non-partisan elections. The 1996 case was California Democratic Party v Lundgren, 919 F.Supp. 1397.

The new San Diego lawsuit also challenges a ban on a candidate spending or raising money more than a year before the election. The individual candidate-plaintiff, Phil Thalheimer, points out that it is even illegal for him to spend his own money on his own potential campaign for city council in 2012.

National Conference of State Legislatures Has Useful Database of Pending Election Law Bills

Posted on by December 23, 2009
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For some years, the National Conference of State Legislatures has been keeping a very useful database of bills in state legislatures that amend election laws. Here is a link to that database. One can choose to look at all the election law bills introduced in any single state, in any recent year. Or one can choose to see bills in all states on particular election law subjects, or any combination.

The hard work of finding these bills is mostly handled by Jennie Drage Bowser, with help from Tom Intorcio and Tim Storey, all members of the staff of NCSL. The headquarters of NCSL is in Denver.

The database does not include pre-filed bills. Bills don’t appear on the database until any particular state legislature has convened. Almost all state legislatures will meet in regular session during 2010. Most of them convene the second week of January.

Connecticut Legislature Ends Latest Special Session, Takes No Action on Public Funding Law

Posted on by December 23, 2009
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The Connecticut legislature had a brief special session this week, but again it took no action to amend the law on public funding for candidates for state office. So, the original law will be the subject of the upcoming 2nd circuit oral argument on January 13, 2010. The U.S. District Court had invalidated the law on August 27, 2009, and the 2nd circuit is expediting the state’s appeal of that decision. But if the legislature had acted during December, 2009, that could have mooted the case, or at least mooted parts of it. The lawsuit is Green Party of Connecticut v Garfield.