Ron Paul’s wife Carol is on the road to recovery, after three operations in the last five days. See this news from Ron Paul himself.
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The Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court will hold a hearing on September 4 at 10 a.m., in the case titled “In Re: The Substitute Nomination Certificate of Bob Barr as the Libertarian Candidate for President of the U.S.”, no. 414 M.D. 2008. The hearing will be in Philadelphia at the Widener Building, One South Penn Square, 1339 Chestnut Street.
Pennsylvania permits substitution. The petitioning period in presidential election years runs from February through August 1. Since the Libertarian national convention was not held until the end of May, the party kicked off its statewide petition listing stand-in candidates for president and vice-president. Last week, a Republican Party official filed a lawsuit, alleging that the Libertarian Party should not have been permitted to use the stand-in procedure, during June and July, since by then it knew who its actual presidential and vice-presidential candidates were.
Pennsylvania case law is very strong that substitution is good public policy. For example, in 1980, John Anderson won a lawsuit to substitute his vice-presidential candidate, even though Anderson didn’t do the substitution until after the legal deadline. Anderson didn’t choose his v-p nominee until August 25 and the substitution law required the process to be done by August 20, but the Court still ruled in favor of Anderson, saying there is a strong public policy that presidential and vice-presidential candidates listed on the ballot should be the real candidates, not the stand-ins. Anderson v Davis, 419 A 2d 806.
The objector to Barr being listed on the ballot says that it misleads voters to sign for a stand-in, instead of the real candidate. The logical response to that is that the Pennsylvania election laws are to blame. Thirtynine states have a procedure by which an unqualified party can circulate a petition to qualify the party itself. This is known as a “party petition.” It doesn’t list any candidates; it just says the signers desire that that particular party be recognized. Pennsylvania, unfortunately, has no such procedure. If Pennsylvania did have a procedure by which a party can get itself on the ballot before it has chosen its candidate, then this problem would not arise.
See this TV station news article about the lawsuit.
On August 15, Bill Van Allen filed a new federal lawsuit against New York state laws that make it almost impossible for rank-and-file members of the Independence Party to elect local party officers. The case is Van Allen v Walsh, 1:08-cv-876.
The ballot-qualified Independence Party is the only qualified party in New York that has exercised its rights to permit independent voters to vote in its primary. However, New York laws say that when a voter who has been registered “independent” wishes to join a ballot-qualified party (even the Independence Party), they can’t make their membership in their new party effective until the following year. New York is the only state that makes it so difficult for an already-registered voter to join a ballot-qualified party. It is very difficult for members of a small qualified party to get on their own party’s primary ballot for party office. Van Allen argues that the law making it impossible for new members to join a party quickly is not needed for any state purpose, and that it makes it that much more difficult to find volunteers to circulate petitions for candidates for party office, and public office, to get on the party’s primary ballot. The ostensible purpose of the law is to protect parties against “raiding” by hostile outsiders. But Van Allen argues that this rationale has no purpose in a party that has invited independents to vote in its primary.
The lawsuit also attacks the New York state voter registration form, which continues to warn voters that if they register as independents, they will not be able to vote in any party’s primary. That warning is not true in relation to the Independence Party.
Van Allen’s lawsuit would have an easier road to victory if the state officers of the Independence Party would support it. However, so far they have not joined as co-plaintiffs.
Hawaii holds an open primary on September 20, a Saturday. The state has an open primary system. Traditionally, Hawaii has printed primary ballots for each party, and given a complete set of primary ballots to each voter. The voter decides in the privacy of the voting booth which party’s primary ballot to use, and throws away the ballots of the other parties.
This year, only one primary ballot will be printed. At the top, the voter will be asked which party’s primary is desired. Then, the vote-counting machines will only accept votes cast in that particular party. If a voter happens to vote for candidates in both the Democratic and Republican primaries, the machine will only count the votes that were cast in the party that the voter had chosen at the top of the ballot. Thanks to Thomas Jones for this news.
Some major party leaders are worried that voters will choose the “Independent Party” choice at the top of the ballot. The Independent Party was placed on the ballot to get Ralph Nader on the November ballot, for president. However, the Independent Party does have two candidates running for the state legislature, but since each is unopposed in his own district, the Independent Party primary will not be very exciting. Nevertheless, if a voter chooses “Independent Party” at the top of the primary ballot, and then votes for various Democrats or Republicans, his or her vote won’t count.
Ralph Nader’s ballot access lawsuit against Hawaii from 2004 is still pending in the 9th circuit. It argues that the state cannot require six times more signatures for an independent presidential candidate than an entire new party. In some preliminary meditation talks, Hawaii elections officials said they are considering asking the legislature to reduce the number of signatures for independent presidential candidates. If Hawaii had made such a change before 2008, it wouldn’t be faced with the problem of having an “Independent Party” on the primary ballot.
On August 21, the Federal Election Commission unanimously voted to let John McCain withdraw his application for primary season matching funds. However, the Commission also rebutted McCain’s argument that he didn’t need the FEC’s permission to withdraw that application.
McCain had applied for primary season matching funds in 2007, and the FEC had ruled that he had qualified. McCain used that determination to obtain a place on the Republican presidential primary ballots in Delaware and Ohio. Without the certification that he had qualified for the funds, he would have needed to circulate petitions in those two states. However, McCain never took the money.
If the FEC had ruled that he could not withdraw, he would then have been in violation of the law, since he has spent far more than permitted for candidates who accept primary season matching funds. Thanks to ElectionLawBlog for this news.