On October 22, the Executive Committee of the National Republican Committee voted to punish 5 states for choosing delegates too early. The full Republican National Committee will decide whether to implement this recommendation next month. The five state Republican Parties would lose half their delegates to the national convention, because they are choosing delegates before February 5. The five states are Wyoming, Michigan, South Carolina, Florida and New Hampshire. UPDATE: on October 23, the Republican National Committee formally approved this idea, so it is final.

Unlike the Democratic National Committee, the Republican National Committee does not give special privileges to any state party. The Democratic National Committee lets four particular states (New Hampshire, Iowa, Nevada and South Carolina) choose delegates earlier than February 5. Thanks to Thomas Jones for this news.

Bob Bauer, an expert on campaign finance laws and a critic of those laws, has written this in his blog More Soft Money Hard Law. It deals with the interplay between Stephen Colbert’s candidacy in the South Carolina major party presidential primaries, and federal campaign finance restrictions.

Since 1991, West Virginia has had a law that says candidates (other than independent candidates) must be registered members of the party that nominates them. No one had ever thought this law applies to presidential candidates. But on October 18, Betty Ireland, West Virginia Secretary of State, said that even though she feels the law is unwise and perhaps unconstitutional, that she must enforce it. Therefore, she has invited the Mountain Party (the state’s only ballot-qualified party) to sue her. The Mountain Party plans to accept this invitation, and hopes to file the lawsuit early in November.

The Mountain Party pointed out that George W. Bush has not been a registered Republican during the 35 years he has lived in Texas (since Texas doesn’t have registration by party). Yet West Virginia put him on the ballot. The party made the same point about former Presidents George H. W. Bush, and Bill Clinton, as well as Ross Perot (who was on the 1996 West Virginia ballot as the Reform Party nominee). Those three candidates all lived in states without party registration. Also, the Mountain Party said that Ralph Nader was on the West Virginia ballot as the Green Party nominee in 2000, even though he was a registered independent. The Secretary of State responded that this is just because no one had paid any attention to the law in past years.