On November 20, several Washington state officials asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the state’s appeal, on the validity of the “top-two” primary. The U.S. Supreme Court hasn’t assigned a case number yet, but the case, if accepted, would be called “State of Washington v Washington State Republican Party”.

The issue is whether the First Amendment Freedom of Association Clause permits a state to hold elections with party labels on the ballot, yet give the parties no ability to nominate candidates. The 9th circuit had ruled earlier this year that if Washington wants to have an election system in which all candidates run for a particular office on the same primary ballot, and the only the top-two vote-getters are allowed onto the November ballot, party labels must be omitted.

In the opinion of Ballot Access News, the only realistic hope to expand presidential general election debates in 2008, is for people to pester the leading Democratic and Republican candidates for president, and get them to say that if they are nominated, they will agree to participate in at least one debate in the general election campaign that includes the leading minor party and independent candidates.

The only general election presidential debate in U.S. history that included the Republican nominee, the Democratic nominee, and anyone else, was in 1992. Ross Perot was included because both major party nominees wanted him included. The opinion of the debate sponsor, the Commission on Presidential Debates, didn’t really matter.

Democrats and Republicans who want to be president will be spending lots of time in New Hampshire and Iowa, during the next year. If, every time they speak to a group of voters, someone asks them to agree to at least one inclusive general election debate, perhaps eventually some of them will make this commitment. A Republican or Democrat who makes such a commitment would gain certain degree of popularity, since polls consistently show that the public likes debates with more than just two participants.

Perhaps the fairest way to measure a minor party’s showing in U.S. House races, across the nation, is to calculate the median percentage for that party’s nominees.

In the 2006 election, the median percentage for Libertarian candidates for U.S. House was 2.04%, when all the races with only a single major party nominee have been eliminated. That contrasts with the same figure for the Libertarian Party in 2004 of 1.66%.

Also in the 2006 election, the median percentage for Green candidates for U.S. House was 1.41%, when all the races with only a single major party nominee have been eliminated. That contrasts with the Green 2004 figure of 2.41%.

Also in 2006, the median percentage for Constitution candidates for U.S. House was 1.43%, when all the races with only a single major party nominee are set aside. That contrasts with the Constitution 2004 figure of .90%.

And, in 2006, the median for Reform Party nominees was 2.25%.

“Median” means, when any particular party’s candidates are listed in order of what percentage of the vote they got, the median is the percentage in the middle of the list (or, if there is an even number of candidates listed, the median is the halfway point between the two candidates closed to the midpoint).

The number of races in 2006 that each party ran for US House (excluding the races with only one major party nominee) were: Libertarian 102, Green 40, Constitution 26, Reform 5.