On January 19, Oklahoma Representative Marian Cooksey introduced House Bill 1429, which greatly eases ballot access for minor parties. Current law requires 5% of the last vote cast, which for 2006 is a staggering 73,188 valid signatures. The bill would reduce this to 5,000 signatures, which was the requirement in Oklahoma between 1924 and 1974. The bill also lowers the number of votes needed for a party to remain on the ballot, from 10% for president or governor (whichever was most recent) to 1%.

Yesterday, Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell ruled that only optical-scan voting equipment will be used in the future in Ohio. This means that counties that already bought electronic vote-counting equipment must get rid of it.

Today, the US Supreme Court refused to hear Nader v Serody, no. 04-550. This was Nader’s appeal of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision that kept him off the ballot last year.

The issue in the Pennsylvania case was somewhat inappropriate for the US Supreme Court. It was strictly a matter of proper interpretation of Pennsylvania state law, not a constitutional case. It is unclear whether Pennsylvania actually requires petition signers to be registered voters, or just eligible to register to vote. Nader’s US Supreme Court appeals from Texas and Oregon are still pending.