Within the next few weeks, it is likely that the Federal Election Commission will rule on a request by the Socialist Workers Party for an extension of its exemption from reporting who contributes to its federal campaigns.

The U.S. Supreme Court said in 1982 that small political parties that suffer from harrassment from either government agencies, or from private individuals, should not be forced to disclose the identities of people who contribute money to such parties. The FEC has been granting an exemption to the Socialist Workers Party, but the exemptions always expire after six years. The FEC renewed the exemption in 1985, 1991, 1997, and 2003. But in 2003, the vote for an extension was not unanimous, but was 4-2. The two votes in the minority were from Republican David Mason and Democrat Dan McDonald.

The SWP’s exemption expired again on December 31, 2008. The party had submitted evidence of ongoing harassment on October 30, 2008, and the FEC has been pondering the request ever since.

Five of the six FEC Commissioners are very new to the Commission, and weren’t appointed until 2008. The veteran FEC Commissioner is Democrat Ellen Weintraub, who has been serving since 2002. On April 3, 2003, she had voted for another six-year exemption. She said then that with the nation at war, public perception that the views of the SWP are “unpatriotic” and “opposed to the current government” could have a chilling effect on party contributors. She also said in 2003 that “hopefully when this new extension expires in 2008, we will be able to say a further exemption is no longer necessary.”

The other FEC Commissioners are Democrats Cynthia Bauerly and Steven Walther, and Republicans Matthew Petersen, Caroline Hunter, and Donald McGahn.

U.S. House member Bill Posey, a freshman Republican from Florida’s 15th district, has introduced HB 1503. It requires presidential candidates who file with the Federal Election Commission to include a copy of their birth certificate. The 15th district is centered on Florida’s central Atlantic coast, around the city of Melbourne.

The text of the bill is not yet available on the Library of Congress’ web page, http://thomas.loc.gov, but it probably will be by Monday, March 16. UPDATE: here is a copy of the bill, thanks to Ed Still’s VoteLawblog.

In somewhat related news, Orly Taitz, attorney for many of the individuals challenging President Obama’s qualifications, has been able to ask two U.S. Supreme Court Justices about her issue in the last week. On March 9 she was in the audience when Justice Antonin Scalia was speaking, and she asked him about it. He replied simply that it takes 4 justices for the Court to accept a case. On March 13 she was in the audience in Washington state when Chief Justice John Roberts was speaking, and she was able to ask him a question as well. See this story. She asserted that she has proof that Obama is not eligible. The Chief Justice replied that if she has such documents with her, she should hand them to a security officer, who presumably would then have later given them to the Chief Justice. The article does not say if Taitz had any papers with her at the time. Thanks to Bill Van Allen for this news.