New Hampshire House Bill 35 would delete provision for the state’s vice-presidential primary. New Hampshire is the only state that holds such a primary, and very few people ever file in that primary for the office of vice-president. Those who do file are generally very little-known, and the press typically doesn’t even cover the vice-presidential primary results. Thanks to Howard Wilson for this news.
In the November 2008 election, five independent candidates for U.S. House competed against both a Democrat and a Republican, and still managed to exceed 10% of the vote. They were:
1. David Krikorian in Ohio’s 2nd district got 17.71%
2. Cindy Sheehan in California’s 8th district got 16.17%
3. Burt Saunders in Florida’s 14th district got 14.49%
4. Carol Miller in New Mexico’s 3rd district got 12.79%
5. Michael Jackson in Louisiana’s 6th district got 11.59%.
Two minor party candidates for U.S. House polled over 10% even though they were both running against a Democrat as well as a Republican. They were both Minnesota Independence Party nominees. They were David Dillon in the 3rd district with 10.57%, and Bob Anderson in the 6th district with 10.05%.
The three minor parties that run the largest number of candidates across the nation are the Constitution, Green, and Libertarian Parties. In the November 2008 election, here is the best percentage in the nation for each of these party’s U.S. House nominees (excluding races in which one of the two major parties didn’t run anyone):
Constitution Party: Jim Noorlander, in Utah’s 3rd district, polled 6.11%.
Green Party: Carol Wolman, in California’s 1st district, polled 8.54%.
Libertarian Party: Ted Brown, in California’s 26th district, got 6.92%.
Oklahoma Representative Charles Key (R-Oklahoma City) has introduced HB 1072, which lowers the number of signatures to qualify a new party from 5% of the last vote cast, to exactly 5,000 signatures. Earlier, Oklahoma Senator Randy Brogdon had introduced a similar (though more comprehensive) bill in the State Senate, SB 359.
Representative Key has also introduced HB 1340, to require parties to pay for their own presidential primaries. The bill would have no effect on primaries for office other than president.
On January 15, the Ohio Secretary of State ruled that parties that were ballot-qualified during 2008 will also be considered ballot-qualified for 2009 as well. Ohio has no regularly-scheduled partisan elections for federal or state office in 2009. But some municipalities hold partisan elections during 2009.
