Both the Green and Working Families Parties will have statewide candidates on the Massachusetts ballot this year.
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Next year, almost every state legislature will be meeting. It is very common for state legislators to decide which bills they will introduce, during the last few months of even-numbered years. If you live in a state with faulty election laws, and you hope to persuade your state legislature to improve them, now is the time to ask legislators to sponsor such bills. Groups are already working on this project (for ballot access improvements) in California, Georgia, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and perhaps other states.
On August 28, U.S. District Court Judge Patricia Seitz, a Clinton appointee in the southern district (Miami), enjoined the state from enforcing a 2005 law that imposes very large fines on individuals and groups that register voters, if those individuals or groups don’t turn in the registration forms within 10 days after they are filled out. League of Women Voters v Cobb, 06-21265. Thanks to Rick Hasen for this news.
On August 28, Carl Romanelli filed an appeal of his ballot access lawsuit in the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. Romanelli v Caroselli. It argues that the correct number of signatures needed for statewide minor party and independent petitions this year is 15,494, not 67,070. This lawsuit is the only remaining hope for any statewide minor party or independent candidate to be on the Pennsylvania ballot this year, since the rehearing to the 3rd circuit on the constitutional issue, even if granted, would not be heard in time for the election. The challenge proceedings to the Green Party petition are not complete, but since the party turned in 94,000 signatures, and so far 60% of them are invalid, clearly the party won’t be able to show that it has 67,070 valid.
On August 28, a former Republican candidate for Congress filed an objection to the New York Libertarian Party statewide petition. In the thirty years that the Libertarian Party has been getting on the statewide ballot in New York, this is the second time its petitions have been challenged (the other time was 1994, when the party initially nominated Howard Stern for Governor, later replaced by Bob Schulz). So far, there are no challenges this year to the other statewide petitions (filed by the Green, Socialist Workers, and Socialist Equality Parties).