Thanks to Michael Ravnitzky and Eric Garris, the 1992 paper issues of Ballot Access News are now posted on this webpage. See the links to the upper right, for “paper issues” (not to be confused with “blog archives”). Previously, only the paper issues starting in 1993 had been available. 1992 was a dramatic year, because of the Ross Perot independent candidacy, and also for many developments in election law that occurred that year.
The Peace Party became a ballot-qualified party in 2008 in Oregon. It was formed for the purpose of placing Ralph Nader on the ballot in Oregon. At the time, it was significantly easier to qualify a new party in Oregon than to get an independent candidate on the ballot (thanks to good legislative action in 2009, the independent procedures are now easier than they had been in 2008).
Because the Peace Party polled over 1% of the vote for president, it retained its ballot status, and is ballot qualified for 2010. On September 17, it filed paperwork with the Secretary of State to change its name to the Progressive Party. Oregon permits qualified parties to change their names. However, voters who had been registered in the Peace Party will need to change their registration, if they wish to continue being a member of the party under its new name.
Oregon and Vermont are now the two states that have a ballot-qualified party named the Progressive Party.
On September 18, a candidate for Mayor of Central Falls, Rhode Island, filed a federal lawsuit to invalidate a city ordinance that says that if a voter signs petitions for two different candidates for the same office, the signature counts for the candidate who submits his or her petition first, and is void for the other candidate. The case is Fontes v City of Central Falls.
The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld laws that say a voter may sign for only one candidate for a particular office. However, generally when jurisdictions limit a voter to signing for only one candidate per office, that jurisdiction provides that the signatures should be dated. Petitions for city office in Central Falls don’t seem to have space for a date.
The case arose when Hipolito Fontes was told that he only had 197 valid signatures to run for Mayor, even though he submitted 333 signatures to meet a requirement of 200. Fontes says that campaign workers for a rival candidate followed him while he was petitioning, and endeavored to persuade voters who had signed his petition to then sign the rival petition. Fontes also says that city elections officials manipulated the process by which each candidate tried to file at the first moment permitted for filing such petitions.
On September 16, the city of Tucson filed a lawsuit in state court, arguing that the State Constitution permits the city to decide for itself whether it wishes to use partisan or non-partisan elections. The Tucson City Charter calls for partisan elections, and the voters approved it and later voted down attempts to repeal it. However, earlier this year, the state passed a law requiring all cities to use non-partisan elections. The case is City of Tucson v State, Pima Co. Superior Court, C2009-7207.
On September 18, the Massachusetts Libertarian Party won its 2008 case on presidential substitution. The decision was not surprising, because the same court had granted injunctive relief last year. The issue is whether an unqualified party can use a stand-in presidential candidate on its petition, if it is circulating its petition before it knows who its actual presidential candidate will be. The decision is 13 pages long and says, “”Such a right to substitute is guaranteed by the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution to ensure that the names of the actual candidates appear on the ballot.” The case is Barr v Galvan, civ. 08-11340-NMG. It is not known if the state will appeal to the First Circuit.
The Equal Protection Clause is relevant because Massachusetts, and all states, lets qualified parties substitute a new nominee for President or Vice-President if the original nominee withdraws before the ballots are printed. For example, in July 1972, the Democratic National Convention chose Thomas Eagleton for vice-president, and his name was certified to the elections officials of all states. In August 1972, Eagleton resigned from the ticket, and the Democratic Party replaced him with R. Sargent Shriver. All states printed Shriver’s name on the ballot (except for Arizona and North Dakota, the two states that never print any vice-presidential nominees on general election ballots).
