Just being on the ballot in a two-person race does not automatically mean that a minor party candidate will get a fairly respectable share of the vote. This is evident when one looks at the race for Delaware State Representative, 20th district, from the November 2008 election. The only two candidates on the ballot were Republican Nick Manolakos, and the nominee of the Blue Enigma Party, Daniel D. Rappa, Jr.

The vote was 8,045 for Manolakos, and only 24 votes for Rappa. The Blue Enigma Party stood for increasing the salaries of Delaware public school teachers. It ran one candidate for Governor and three for the legislature.

On January 13, the Tennessee legislature came into session. Even though Republicans had a bare majority in the State House, Democrats elected Kent Williams Speaker. Williams is a Republican, but all the votes for him (except his own vote) came from Democrats. Williams says he will appoint Committee Chairmen from both major parties. See this article.

This Tennessee legislature appoints the Secretary of State. It is unclear as to whether Tuesday’s news means that long-time Democratic Secretary of State Riley Darnell will remain in office.

Bills have been introduced in the Arkansas legislature to move the presidential primary from February to May. They are SB 56 and HB 1021. Arkansas held its presidential primary to February in 2008, but most state legislators now feel the early primary was not productive. So many other states also voted in February, Arkansas’ presidential primary got little attention.

The ballot access improvement bill still has not been introduced in Arkansas.