According to this story, published August 22, Tennessee state election officials will consider whether to start listing Republican nominees first on the general election ballots.

Ever since Tennessee has used government-printed ballots, starting in 1889, Democratic nominees have been listed first, followed by Republican nominees, followed by the nominees of other qualified parties, followed by independents. Independents have been listed in alphabetical order. Oddly, Tennessee has no law on the subject of the order of party nominees on the ballot. Some counties use office-group ballot format and some use party column format, but the traditional “Democrats first” applies to both types of county.

Some courts have held that states must use neutral principles when they determine the order of candidates on ballots. The most recent decision was from the New Hampshire Supreme Court, which ruled in 2006 that the Constitution requires that party columns be rotated. That case was called Akins v Secretary of State.

The U.S. District Court in Idaho that is hearing Daien v Ysursa has set a briefing schedule. This is the case that challenges Idaho’s ban on out-of-state circulators for independent presidential candidates. It had been filed April 7. The first brief is due September 8.

Ken Blevens, who has been a Libertarian Party candidate in New Hampshire in many elections in the past, will run for the U.S. Senate in 2010. Blevens has name recognition, because of his past runs. In 2008 he polled 3.10% for U.S. Senate.

New Hampshire parties must poll 4% for either Governor or U.S. Senate to attain qualified status. New Hampshire required 3%, until 1997, when the legislature raised the requirement to 4%. New Hampshire and Pennsylvania are the only states in the last 25 years that have made it more difficult for a party to remain on the ballot. Meanwhile, in the last 25 years, twenty four states have made it easier for a party to remain on: Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Texas, Virginia, and Wyoming.

New Hampshire is the only New England state in which only the Democratic and Republican Parties are qualified parties. In Connecticut, although the Working Families Party, the Green Party, and the Libertarian Party are not ballot-qualified for every partisan office, they are all ballot-qualified for at least some offices throughout the entire state. Connecticut is difficult to characterize because the vote test refers separately to each office.