Golisano Won’t Run for Governor of New York

January 31st, 2006

Billionaire Tom Golisano said on January 31 that he will not run for Governor of New York this year. He had been the Independence Party’s candidate in 1994, 1998 and 2002. He had changed his registration to “Republican” and most observers felt he would be a candidate this year for the Republican nomination.



Peace & Freedom Party Threatened

January 31st, 2006

The California Secretary of State, Bruce McPherson, seems to be on the verge of reversing 75 years of precedent, and ruling that a party that first qualified in a presidential election year cannot be on the following gubernatorial election ballot two years later, unless it has registration equal to 1% of the last gubernatorial vote.

The California election code section defining political parties has not changed in structure since 1929. Always, in the past, a party that qualifies in a presidential year is assumed to remain qualified, until it fails either the vote test or the registration test. The registration test is only one-fifteenth of 1%, and the vote test is 2% for any statewide race in a gubernatorial election year.

Peace & Freedom qualified in 2004. Since it wasn’t on the ballot in 2002, obviously it didn’t poll 2% of the vote for any statewide race in 2002. Precedents from 1934 (the Liberty Party), 1950 (Independent Progressive Party), 1970 (Peace & Freedom Party), and 1998 (Natural Law Party), all agree that a party that first qualifies in a presidential year remains on the ballot until it fails either test. PFP has not failed either test. Yet, the Secretary of State is saying it must, in effect, re-qualify this year.

The Secretary of State’s office has been furnished with the historical information, and the final decision is still pending.

Congressman Obey’s Public Funding Bill Will Discriminate

January 31st, 2006

Congressman David Obey’s public funding bill for congressional candidates will be introduced on February 1. The bill will be roughly similar to Connecticut’s new public funding bill for state office. If the candidate is the nominee of a party that had averaged 25% of the vote in the last two elections for that particular office, that candidate will receive full funding. Independent candidates will be treated like parties, so that Bernie Sanders would receive funding if he had averaged 25% in the last two elections. However, independents running for the first time, and new parties, and parties that had not polled very well in the past could only get full funding if they submitted a petition signed by 20% of the last vote cast for that office. A 10% petition would result in partial funding. The bill would outlaw private money for everyone, so minor parties which couldn’t qualify for public funding would not be able to spend any money at all.

New Mexico Bill Makes Ballot Access Worse

January 30th, 2006

House Bill 453 has been introduced in the New Mexico legislature. Among other things, it moves the petition deadline for minor party nominee-petitions from mid-July to early June. New Mexico legislators seem blissfully oblivous to the need to abolish nominee-petitions. New Mexico is the only state in the nation which requires one petition to qualify the party, and then additional petitions for each of that new party’s nominees. The same system was declared unconstitutional in Maryland in 2003. Minor party representatives presented this information last year to a commission organized to reform the election laws. But the information seems to have fallen on deaf ears.

Texas Ballot Access Victory

January 28th, 2006

On January 27, the Texas Supreme Court ruled that minor technical problems with petitions should not keep candidates off the ballot. The Court ordered two candidates for Judge of the Criminal Appeals court onto the Republican primary ballot. In re Holcomb, 06-40, and In re Francis, 06-42. One candidate was 5 signatures short (he needed 700) and one candidate made a typographical error on his petition.

New York Ballot Access Victory

January 28th, 2006

On January 27 (Friday), late in the day, U.S. District Court Judge John Gleeson declared unconstitutional the ballot access requirements for candidates seeking a place on major party primaries, for the office of Delegate to Judicial Nominating Conventions. The law required 500 signatures in each Assembly District. New York has 12 districts for electing State Supreme Court Justices, and each district contains between 9 and 24 Assembly districts (or parts of Assembly districts). Therefore, people who wanted a major party nomination for Supreme Court Justice needed to organize slates of candidates for Delegate to the nominating conventions, and then petition to get these slates on the primary ballots. To do this, they need between 4,500 valid signatures, and 12,000 valid signatures, depending on which district they are running in. Only 37 days were permitted to get these signatures. Torres v N.Y. State Bd. of Elections, 04-cv-1129.

Nader asks for Rehearing in Michigan Case

January 26th, 2006

On January 24, Ralph Nader asked the entire 6th circuit to rehear his ballot access case against Michigan. The issue is whether the Secretary of State should have placed him on the ballot as the Reform Party nominee in 2004. The Reform Party was ballot-qualified, but Michigan refused to list any of its nominees (for any office) because of an internal dispute over the party officers.

Libel Case Against Socialist Workers Party newspaper postponed

January 26th, 2006

Owners of a Utah coal mine sued the Militant (newspaper of the Socialist Workers Party) for libel last year. The case is in federal court in Salt Lake City. The hearing set for January 25 was postponed until February 17.

New Hampshire Legislative Hearing

January 26th, 2006

On January 31, the New Hampshire House Elections Law Committee will hold a hearing on HB 1385, which would lower the vote test for the definition of “party”, from a vote of 4% for Governor or US Senator, to a vote of 2%. It would also lower the number of signatures for statewide minor party and independent candidates from 3,000 to 2,000. The hearing is at 1 p.m. in room 308 of the Legislative Office Building.

Former Republican Alaska Legislator to be Independent Gubernatorial Candidate

January 25th, 2006

On January 25, former Republican legislator Andrew Halcro announced that he will run for Governr of Alaska as an independent this year.

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Welcome to the OFFICIAL online home of Ballot Access News, a non-partisan newsletter reporting on the trials and tribulations of folks trying to put candidates on the ballot in the United States of America. There are many surprisingly restrictive ballot access laws in this country, which the average voter has no knowledge or conception of; part of our purpose here (besides reporting on progress made) is to report on these restrictive ballot access laws so that more people are aware of them. I hope you find these materials interesting and exciting; if you do, you can support the newsletter by subscribing!

Ballot Access News is edited and published by Richard Winger, the nation's leading expert on ballot access legal issues.

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  • Politics, Soviet-style by S. Philip Gordon, regarding recent ballot access issues in Georgia – the US state, not the Russian territority!

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Other information:

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  • Here's information on Presidential Ballot Access as well as the vote totals of recent Presidential elections.

  • Here are some other sites which may also be of interest:

    Project Vote-Smart

    Project Vote Smart is a citizens' organization dedicated to serving all Americans with accurate and unbiased information for electoral decision-making. It was inaugerated in 1992 by former US Presidents Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford, and other leaders. Its webpage offers information about all ballot-listed candidates for all federal and state office.
    [Added:040729]

    The ACE Project
    An interesting site concerning itself with the "Administration and Cost of Elections", including issues of fairness and regulatory approaches in various countries. They seem to be almost blind to the ways that third parties in the USA are harmed by campaign finance rules crafted for the problems characteristic of the larger parties, or the ways that third parties would be disenfranchised by various proposed rules, but this is nevertheless a useful resource, particularly for the international comparisons it makes.
    [Added:001206]

    "Unofficial" B.A.N. Page

    At first, it looks like there's not much here. But then you follow the "Charts" link, and click on one of the listed candidates, and you'll get some truly wonderful nationwide maps of voting patterns.
    [Checked:991014]

    ThirdPartyNews.net

    A site that covers news about minor parties.
    [Checked:060414]

    Third Party Central

    Collects lots of good information and links relating to various third parties into one convenient location. Nice set of writings on why one should vote third-party.
    [Checked:991014]

    Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections

    A surprisingly complete listing of votes cast in Presidential elections, including numerous third-party candidates and nice maps of vote distribution by state and (on the individual state pages) by county.
    [New-URL:010309]

    D.C.'s Political Report

    Very good presentation of candidate and party information, including virtually every known third-party group in the USA. Election results, candidate information, etc.
    [Updated:991214]

    Initiative For Texas

    A group trying to establish the right to Initiative and Referendum in Texas. Their work has intriguing parallels and overlaps with ballot access work. Every page at the site seems to have some music on it, which can get annoying after awhile, but otherwise it's an interesting site.
    [Checked:991014]

    Center for Voting and Democracy

    Folks concerned with alternative voting systems, and related issues, from a moderately leftist perspective. Useful articles describing how better systems of voting and electing actually work.
    [Added:000823]

The newsletter is published by and copyright by Richard Winger.