The Arkansas Green Party expects to begin its 2008 petition for ballot status on July 24. Currently, there are no qualified parties on the ballot in Arkansas except for the two major parties. Parties set their own petitioning period, but must get the job done in only 60 days. 10,000 valid signatures are required.
Parties that only wish to be on for president only need 1,000, and can take as long as they wish.
UPDATE: The Green petition will start on July 30.
Iowa newspapers on July 19 reported the news that Iowans will soon be able to register in certain political parties, other than the Democratic and Republican Parties. See here for one of these stories. As noted on this blog on June 27, unqualified parties that submit 850 signatures will be entitled to a list of the names and addresses of people who register into those parties. The voter registration form will contain a blank line labelled “Other” for the “political party” question, in addition to the 3 old choices of “Democratic”, “Republican” and “independent.”
The 10th circuit has tentatively set October 1, 2007 as the hearing date in Libertarian Party of New Mexico v Vigil-Giron, 06-2303. This is the case challenging the state’s policy of one petition to qualify a new party (which then nominates by convention), and then separate hefty petitions for each person the party nominates. The party argues that one petition should be sufficient to show that the party has a modicum of voter support, and additional petitions for all of its nominees have no function. The lower court had upheld the law without even scheduling a hearing. The main issue before the 10th circuit is whether the U.S. District Court should have gathered evidence before ruling. The 10th circuit hearing is in Denver.
On June 8, 2007, a federal lawsuit on the subject of where circulators may work was successfully settled. The cities of Grand Island and Omaha issued memos to their employees saying, “Petition signature gathering is permitted on the exterior areas of library property, including the connecting walkways.”
The city of Lincoln issued a memo to its employees, saying “All city departments may have contact with people exercising various First Amendment rights, including, but not limited to, petition signature gatherers. Please be aware that the First Amendment allows a great deal of latitude to people exercising their First Amendment rights.”
Douglas County issued a memo letting people petition in the common exterior areas of the County Hall of Justice and Civic Center Complex.
This case, Groene v Seng, 4:06cv3153, had been filed in 2006. The various governmental departments paid attorneys fees of $100,000 and settled the lawsuit with no need for a judicial opinion.
On July 18, the Michigan Senate Campaigns & Elections Committee passed both SB624 and SB625. They both set up presidential primaries in which voters would need to request a primary ballot, and each party would receive a list of voters who had chosen that party’s primary ballot.
This is a change from past Michigan presidential primaries, in which voters decided in the secrecy of the voting booth which presidential primary to vote in. In recent years Democrats have not even held a presidential primary in Michigan, because national party rules forbid that type of presidential primary.
SB624 and SB625 are identical, except that SB624 sets up a January 29 primary date, whereas SB625 sets up a February 5 date. However, both bills give the two major parties flexibility to move the date of the presidential primary, if they both agree. Also, both bills make it more difficult for a party to qualify for its own presidential primary. Existing law provides a presidential primary for any party that got 5% of the vote for president in the last election, in the entire U.S. These bills change that to 25% within Michigan.
