Pennsylvania State Representative Kerry Benninghoff kindly telephoned today to say he will introduce his ballot access reform bill this year. He expects to be re-elected and he will also introduce it next year, since it seems unlikely to pass this year. The bill will eliminate mandatory ballot access petitions for all candidates, those seeking access in a primary as well as those petitioning for a spot on the November ballot.
On June 6, the Ohio Libertarian Party filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court against the Ohio Secretary of State, alleging that the party is a qualified party and should have its nominees for president, vice-president, Congress and state legislature placed on the November ballot. Libertarian Party of Ohio v Brunner, 08-391. The old law on how a new party gets on the ballot was struck down in 2006 and the legislature still hasn’t written a new law. The party took matters into its own hands and filed a petition of 6,500 signatures in early March 2008, and a list of its nominees (who had been nominated by convention).
The Secretary of State had created a new ballot access procedure, which was 20,114 signatures by November 2007. The Libertarian Party makes three arguments: (1) it has shown a modicum of support; (2) in the absense of a valid statutory procedure for new party recognition, the state cannot keep a party with a modicum of support off the ballot; (3) even if the Secretary of State did have authority to create a new ballot access hurdle, the hurdle she chose is also unconstitutional. No reported court decision has ever upheld a petition deadline for a new party that is earlier than April of an election year. The party was careful to submit its signatures before the Ohio March primary in any event.
Colorado has five ballot-qualified parties, and their presidential nominees go on the November ballot automatically. Also, Colorado lets the presidential nominees of unqualified parties, and also independent presidential candidates, get on the ballot by paying $500 and submitting a list of presidential elector candidates. So far, the only presidential candidate who has filed under that procedure is Gene Amondson of the Prohibition Party. The deadline is June 17. Amondson is also already on the ballot in Florida.
Colorado has the 4th earliest deadline in the nation for independent presidential candidates to get on the ballot. The only states that are earlier are Texas, Arizona and North Carolina. No one qualified by petition in Texas this year for president, and only Ralph Nader submitted an independent petition in Arizona. No independent presidential candidate is expected to qualify in North Carolina.
The Socialist Workers Party is running Roger Calero for president. The party has already submitted its petition for president in New Jersey. The New Jersey deadline is not until July 28, and no other minor party or independent presidential petitions have been submitted yet in New Jersey.
The SWP also expects to be on in Delaware for the first time in its history. It gathered the necessary registered members in 2004 to be on the ballot, but they were not gathered until too late to be on the 2004 ballot. Delaware requires a party to have 284 registered members in order to be on the ballot; there is no petition.
The SWP is also petitioning for president now in Washington, and will pay the $500 filing fee in Colorado and Louisiana. Other states in which petitioning may be carried out are Iowa, Minnesota, Mississippi, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin.
Filing for the Washington state August primary closes at the end of the day, Friday, June 6. As of 11:00 am, Pacific time, few minor party candidates had filed. The only minor party candidates for the 8 statewide partisan offices are three Constitution Party members, and one from the Party of Commons.
For US House, the only minor party candidates so far are one Green, one Libertarian, and one Constitution Party member.
For state legislature, there are so far two Greens, one Progressive, one Progressive Democrat, one from America’s Third Party, and one from the No Gas Taxes Party.
A substantial number of Republicans are filing as preferring the “GOP Party” or just the “R Party”, and a few Democrats are filing as preferring the “D Party”.
