On May 23, U.S. District Court Judge Morrison C. England issued a 23-page opinion in Grinols v Electoral College, eastern district, California, 2:12cv-2997. The subject is presidential qualifications. The lead plaintiff, James Grinols, was a Republican presidential elector candidate in 2012. The plaintiffs had filed the case last year, to stop the California presidential electors from voting for President Obama.

The decision carries a comprehensive list of all the lawsuits on this subject filed in the last five years; there appear to be twelve such cases. The opinion also has a comprehensive survey of decisions that wrestle with the subject of whether a presidential candidate, or a candidate for presidential elector, has standing to challenge the qualifications (and hence ballot placement) for a competing candidate. The decision concludes by saying that plaintiffs’ only remedy is to either work for the impeachment of the President, or to persuade Congress to appoint a special prosecutor concerning forged birth documents, or to work for a Constitutional Amendment to more clearly define “natural-born citizen.”

On May 23, the California Assembly passed AB 141, which says that when a primary write-in candidate for Congress or partisan state office places second in the primary, he or she still can’t advance to the general election, unless the write-in total was quite large. For U.S. House, about 2,300 write-ins would be required; for State Senate 3,000; for Assembly 1,500; for statewide office 120,000.

If this bill had been in effect in 2012, California voters would have seen eight one-candidate elections on their ballot, instead of just two. The only minor party candidates who appeared on the November 2012 ballot (for office other than President) were three Peace & Freedom candidates for the legislature. All three came in second in the primary on write-in votes, which was easy to do because only one person was on the primary ballot in each of the three races.

On May 24, the California Assembly Appropriations Committee passed the companion measure, ACA 9. AB 141 can’t go into effect unless the voters approve a constitutional amendment, so if both ACA 9 and AB 141 are signed into law, they will be subject to a popular vote in June 2014.

Only two Democrats in the Assembly voted against AB 141, even though it has a Republican sponsor. They are Tom Ammiano and Mike Gatto. Republicans voting against AB 141 are Travis Allen, Connie Conway, Tim Donnelly, Curt Hagman, Allan Mansoor, and Jim Patterson.

On May 20, the Texas legislature passed SB 817. This bill had been requested by Texas Libertarians. It allows parties that nominate by convention to nominate someone, even though that person also holds party office. Also, it moves the state convention for such parties from the second Saturday in June, to the second Saturday in April. The party felt that its nominees will be advantaged if they are nominated earlier in the year. The major party primaries are in March.

A somewhat better approach would have been to let convention parties decide for themselves when to hold the state convention, but Texas has a strong tradition of regulating party activities and such an idea probably would not have passed.

Utah is the only state in which it is impossible for a candidate to get on a partisan primary ballot unless he or she has substantial support at a party convention (except that in Virginia, sometimes there are no primaries, when the major parties choose not to have a primary). A group in Utah has announced plans to place a statwide initiative on the ballot. The initiative would provide a means for candidates to petition for a place on a party primary ballot, so that they could seek their party’s nomination regardless of whether they have support at the convention. Here is the group’s web page. Here is a story about the effort. Thanks to Rob Latham for the links.