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On January 21, the Georgia Green Party issued a press release titled, “Georgia Green Party Kicks Off Ballot Access Drive for 2008”. The release says, for the first time, the party will attempt to qualify as a statewide party. That will require 44,089 valid signatures, to be collected between April 2007 and July 2008.
Across the U.S., only one higher ballot access barrier has ever been overcome by a state Green Party. That was the California registration drive in 1991, which required the party to persuade 79,188 people to register into the party. Even the Texas Green 2000 petition didn’t need as many signatures as will be needed in Georgia; the Texas 2000 petition drive required 37,381 signatures.
However, if the Georgia Greens can succeed, the rewards for them will be great. Once the petition is complete, the party will probably be able to remain ballot-qualified (for statewide office only, since the statewide petition only affects statewide offices) indefinitely into the future. A statewide party in Georgia remains on the ballot as long as it polls a number of votes equal to 1% of the statewide registration. Since Georgia usually elects 9 or 10 statewide officers in mid-term years, any diligent party can poll the needed votes for at least one of those offices. In presidential years there are always one, two or three races for Public Service Commissioner, another office for which voters are generous to minor parties with their votes.
It is true that the Georgia Reform Party failed to poll enough votes to retain its place on the ballot in 1998, but that is because the party foolishly only ran a candidate for Lieutenant Governor, when it could have just as easily run as many as nine other statewide candidates, one of which surely would have polled enough votes.
On January 19, 2007, the 9th circuit issued an opinion in Citizens for Clean Government v City of San Diego, no. 04-56964. San Diego has a $250 contribution limit to candidates for city council. The question was whether the city could enforce this limit against a group that was trying to raise money to hire paid petitioners to circulate a recall petition against a member of the city council.
The U.S. District Court had said the city could limit campaign contributions to a committee that was raising money to hire paid circulators for a recall petition. But the 9th circuit said that this conclusion isn’t necessarily valid, at least in the absense of any hard evidence. The 9th circuit remanded the case back to the U.S. District Court, but made it plain that unless the city can show that someone would be bribed by a policy of allowing unlimited contributions to a recall petition effort, the limit is unconstitutional in that situation.
The whole rationale for campaign contribution limits has been the fear that if campaign contribution limits didn’t exist, wealthy individuals could give a great deal of money to a candidate, hope that candidate got elected, and then expect the candidate (now an office-holder) to do favors for the donor. But contributions to some cause that isn’t trying to elect a particular person are outside the scope of this fear.
The precedent may help to persuade a federal court in Washington, D.C., to overturn a Federal Election Commission ruling, and let Unity08 raise unlimited contributions to finance petition drives to get itself on the ballot. Unity08 has no candidate at this time. No known particular candidate will be helped by such petition drives, especially during an odd year.
The New Hampshire House Election Law Committee took testimony on January 24 on HB 48, a bill to change the definition of “party” from one that got 4% for Governor or US Senator, to one that got 2% for either of those offices.
Approximately twelve people testified in favor, and no one formally opposed the bill. An assistant to the Secretary of State had some concerns about details, but did not hold himself out as opposed to the bill. The Committee won’t vote on the bill until early February.
New Hampshire is the only New England state in which no party, other than the Democratic and Republican Parties, has been qualified during the past six years. If the bill passed, there would still be no new qualified parties in New Hampshire until after the 2008 election at the earliest. New Hampshire elects its Governor every two years, and also has a U.S. Senate election in 2008.
Texas State Representative Mark Strama (D-Pflugerville) will soon introduce a bill to repeal the law that makes it illegal for primary voters to sign a petition for an independent candidate or a new party. Strama was elected to the legislature in 2004. He has long had a special interest in the electoral process. He was Director of Programs for Rock the Vote between 1995 and 1997, and he was CEO of NewVoter.com between 1998 and 2000. He hopes to find a Republican co-sponsor for the bill before he introduces it.