The Massachusetts legislature ended its session in the middle of the night (July 31-August 1), without passing either high-profile election law bill. H.4952 was the National Popular Vote Plan bill, and S.2807 would have instituted election-day voter registration.

The National Popular Vote Plan bill had passed both houses, but the accompanying vote to send the bill to the governor never took place. Election-day registration had passed the Senate on July 30, but didn’t get a vote in the House. Thanks to Jack Dean for this news. Here is more detail about the chaotic last few hours of the session.

A Peace and Freedom Party member expects to attend to state convention in Sacramento August 2-3 (with preliminary social activities with the presidential candidates on the evening of August 1), and she expects to blog at this web site. Thanks to C.T. Weber for this news.

The Pennsylvania petition deadline is August 1. The Green Party of Pennsylvania is hoping that the Reconstruction Party of Philadelphia will have secured enough signatures on the Green petition to give it a chance of succeeding. The state requires 24,666 signatures. Petitions are accepted if they have enough signatures on their face, unless somone challenges. The Libertarian and Constitution Parties are also turning in their petitions on August 1, and Ralph Nader is submitting his on the same day, at 11 a.m. Nader has already released a press release saying he will be turning in 53,000 signatures. The Libertarians expect to submit 47,000.