Kentucky Representatives Kathy Stein (D-Lexington) and Jim Wayne (D-Louisville) have introduced HB 55, to establish public funding for legislative candidates. The bill treats all candidates alike, regardless of a candidate’s partisan affiliation. Candidates for State Senate would qualify by receiving at least $10 from 275 residents of their district; candidates for State House would need such contributions from 100 residents of their district. Qualifying State Senate candidates would receive $54,000; State House candidates would receive $20,000.

On February 13, the Idaho House State Affairs Committee introduced HB 185. It provides, for the first time in Idaho history, that the voter registration form should ask voters to choose a party. Then, there would be separate primary ballots for each party. Parties would have the right to decide for themselves if independent voters could vote in their primaries.

The bill seems to be deficient, in that no provision is made for voters to register as members of unqualified parties. The 10th circuit and the 2nd circuit have ruled that the U.S. Constitution protects the right of a voter to join a party, even if it isn’t ballot-qualified. New Jersey state courts have agreed. Idaho is in the 9th circuit; the issue has never arisen in the 9th circuit.

California Assemblywoman Audra Strickland has tentatively agreed to introduce a bill to moderate the California minimum vote threshold for write-in candidates at partisan primaries. Slightly over half the states permit write-in votes in partisan primaries. Most of these states set a minimum number of write-ins needed for someone to win a primary by write-in vote. California has one of the most stringent such minimum vote tests. It is so severe, no one got nominated by write-in at California’s June 2006 primary, even though there were 7 races in which one of the two major parties tried very hard to nominate someone by write-in (in all 7 cases, no one had qualified to appear on the primary ballot of that party, so a write-in nomination was the only hope for that party to have a nominee on the November ballot).