On February 4, the South Carolina House Judiciary Committee passed H3067, the bill that makes it illegal for two parties to jointly nominate the same candidate. The bill is sponsored by 7 Republican representatives, including the Majority Leader.

The South Carolina House has always seemed more interested in eliminating fusion than the South Carolina Senate has. Back in 2006, the House had passed a similar bill on January 27, but when the 2006 bill got to the Senate, it did not advance any further.

On February 6, the Virginia House Privileges and Elections Committee passed HB 2642 by a vote of 22-0, after amending the bill. The amended bill makes it a crime for anyone to pay petition circulators on a per-signature basis, or even to offer. It would also be a crime for anyone to ask to be paid on a per-signature basis, or to be paid that way.

The part of the bill that requires voters to prove they are citizens before registering to vote was deleted. The only remaining other provisions of the bill require the State Board of Elections to delete the names of voters shown as deceased in Social Security records, and a ban on paying people to register voters on a per-registration basis.

Here is a link to the 61-page memorandum in ProtectMarriage.com v Bowen, the decision that rejected a request that the names and addresses of donors to California’s Proposition 8 be kept private. Proposition 8 last year was the same-sex marriage initiative. Although the U.S. Supreme Court had ruled in 1982 that the Socialist Workers Party could keep the names of its donors secret, this new decision declines to apply that precedent to donors in favor of Prop. 8. The case is not over. Even though the donors failed to win injunctive relief, they will pursue the issue of declaratory relief for future initiatives.