On August 20, U.S. Supreme Court Justice David Souter denied injunctive relief to Herb Hoffman, the independent U.S. Senate candidate in Maine. Souter did not refer the case to the other justices, and he did not write anything; he simply denied the request for injunctive relief. The case is Knutson v Department of the Secretary of State, 08A138. The order came down at 5:10 pm eastern time.
On August 20, U.S. Supreme Court Justice David Souter denied injunctive relief to Herb Hoffman, the independent U.S. Senate candidate in Maine. Souter did not refer the case to the other justices, and he did not write anything; he simply denied the request for injunctive relief. The case is Knutson v Department of the Secretary of State, 08A138. The order came down at 5:10 pm eastern time.
A U.S. District Court in Charleston, West Virginia, has set a hearing in Barr v Ireland for August 27 (Wednesday), at 1:30 p.m. The case challenges the August 1 petition deadline for presidential independent candidates, and the presidential nominees of unqualified parties. 2:08cv-0990.
The New Hampshire Libertarian Party’s position on whether to participate in a proposed lawsuit on substitution is not clear. I have just arrived home from a vacation and this evening, it is too late for me to telephone any New Hampshire Libertarian Party officials.
New Hampshire ballot access is far worse than most people realize. The Green Party has only succeeded in getting on the New Hampshire ballot statewide once, in 2000. The Natural Law Party failed in both 1996 and 2000 in New Hampshire. The Constitution Party failed in both 2004 and 2008 in New Hampshire. The Libertarian Party failed for president in two states in 2004, New Hampshire and Oklahoma. Also, in 2006, the Libertarian Party had only two statewide petition failures, Alabama and New Hampshire.
New Hampshire’s legislature has been very hostile to minor party and independent candidate ballot access. Many bills to improve the law have been introduced during the past ten years, but none of them passed in either House. The Secretary of State is hostile, and the legislature will not approve any election law change that he opposes.
The best way to persuade a state legislature to improve ballot access laws is to win a lawsuit against one of the ballot access laws. The New Hampshire policy forbidding substitution can probably be defeated in court, if the New Hampshire Libertarian Party will help that effort. New Hampshire is one of only two states which has never had any ballot access law declared unconstitutional. A winning lawsuit on substitution could be the key to winning additional ballot access reform in New Hampshire. The substitution lawsuit is an opportunity that should not be wasted.
The recent publicity that Mike Bloomberg and Ron Paul will appear on the Virginia ballot as candidates for president and vice-president is wrong. Although the Independent Green Party of Virginia did circulate a petition for president with those candidates’ names on it, Virginia law explicitly gives the petitioning group the right to substitute. The Independent Green Party of Virginia has promised to place the Constitution Party national ticket on the ballot, via substitution. Meanwhile, the Independent Green Party of Virginia has been enjoying the publicity.
Also, reports that the Independent Green Party of Virginia got 70,000 signatures on its presidential petition are also wrong. The party got 70,000 raw signatures for all its candidates put together. Virginia requires separate petitions for each candidate, so the 70,000 figure was arrived at by totaling the party’s presidential petition, its U.S. Senate petition, and its various petitions for U.S. House.
