Utah held its primary (for office other than president) on June 24. Jason Chaffetz defeated incumbent Chris Cannon in the Republican primary, for the U.S. House, 3rd district. Chaffetz had been criticized during the campaign because he doesn’t live in the 3rd district. The U.S. Constitution forbids states from requiring candidates for the U.S. House to live in any particular district. However, it is considered unwise (for public relations reasons) for candidates to run in districts, if they don’t live in that district.

Chaffetz lives two miles from the boundary of the 3rd district. The 3rd district is centered on Provo, plus the southern suburbs of Salt Lake City, and is an overwhelmingly Republican district. Chaffetz lives in Alpine, which is in Utah County. Although most of Utah County is in the 3rd district, a small part of that county, including the city of Alpine, is in the 2nd district. Thanks to Rob Latham for this news.

The first person who answers this question gets a free one-year subscription to Ballot Access News (or, if already a subscriber, a free one-year renewal). Barack Obama will be the second presidential candidate in a general election whose name will have been printed on the ballot, whose surname begins with the letter “O”. Who was the first presidential candidate in a general election, whose name was printed on ballots, with a surname starting with “O”?

Put your answer in a comment. E-mail me separately to give me your postal address: richardwinger@yahoo.com.

On a related note, there has never been a presidential candidate on a ballot in a general election whose surname started with these letters: I, Q, X, and Y. UPDATE: I was wrong about “Y”; thanks to that scholarly commenter for correcting this!

On June 24, the U.S. Senate approved five new Federal Election Commissioners. This is good news for Ralph Nader and Cynthia McKinney, since primary season matching funds can now be released (although McKinney hasn’t yet raised enough money to qualify).