Iowa May Settle Lawsuit over Registration into Minor Parties

May 12th, 2006

Iowa is the only state in the union in which people register into parties on voter registration forms, yet people can’t register into any party other than Democratic and Republican. Last year, the Libertarian and Green Parties filed a federal lawsuit against state officials over this problem. The state has indicated they would like to discuss settling the lawsuit out of court. Negotiations are set for the second week in June.



Largest Idaho Newspaper Improves Coverage

May 12th, 2006

The Idaho Statesman, the state’s largest newspaper, has scrapped its old policy of only covering Democratic and Republican candidates (for office other than president) in advance of the Idaho primary. This year’s primary is on May 23. The paper is now covering minor party and independent candidates equally. This result was achieved after Andy Hedden-Nicely (United Party candidate for US House) had called for a boycott of the newspaper.

The United Party of Idaho has ballot status through the Natural Law Party. The Secretary of State has still not ruled on whether he will let the Natural Law Party change its name to the United Party. He says he is too busy to decide until after the primary. Idaho has permitted party name changes in the past.

Kinky Friedman Turns In 169,574 Signatures

May 11th, 2006

On May 11, independent gubernatorial candidate Kinky Friedman turned in 169,574 signatures to the Texas Secretary of State. It is somewhat amusing to see that the Texas Secretary of State has been fighting all attempts to force him to use random sampling. With 223,000 signatures from Carole Strayhorn turned in two days ago, that makes almost 400,000 signatures that need to be verified. Employees of the Secretary of State’s office must not only check to see if each signer is registered. Employees must also check to see if each signer voted in either the March primary, or the April run-off primary. Also the employees need to see if the signer signed both petitions. And if the Green Party manages to turn in enough signatures on May 30 to qualify, that will be tens of thousands of more signatures to verify.

Texas does not have the statewide initiative process, so Texas elections officials are not accustomed to verifying hundreds of thousands of signatures.

New Bill for D.C. Voting Representative in US House

May 11th, 2006

On May 11, Congressman Thomas Davis (R-Virginia) and Eleanor Holmes Norton (DC’s Democratic Delegate to the US House) held a press conference to announce their co-sponsorship of a new bill. The bill, which doesn’t have a number yet, would give D.C. a voting member of the U.S. House. It would also give a new member to Utah (the state that was closest to deserving an additional seat after the 2000 census). It would also permanently enlarge the size of the U.S. House from 435 to 437 members. The new Utah seat would be at-large for the remainder of this decade.

The reason for giving Utah a new seat is that it is the only way to persuade Republicans to vote for the bill. Since it is considered virtually certain that the new D.C. seat would be a Democratic seat, giving Utah another seat balances the partisan change, since it is assumed the new at-large Utah seat would be Republican. The reason for making the new Utah seat at-large is that it avoids a messy fight in the Utah legislature over drawing new districts.

Congressman Davis had introduced a somewhat similar bill last year, but this bill is considered likely to pass, since it has the support of Eleanor Holmes Norton, whereas the first bill didn’t have her support.

Mississippi Democrats Lose Injunctive Relief on Open Primary

May 10th, 2006

On May 10, a U.S. District Court Judge in Greenville, Mississippi, denied injunctive relief to the Mississippi Democratic Party. The party had filed a lawsuit in February 2006, hoping to win a ruling that it could exclude non-members of the party from voting in its June 2006 primary. Mississippi Democratic Party v Barbour, 4:06-cv-29. Mississippi doesn’t have registration by party, so the Democratic Party’s requested relief is somewhat awkward to implement.

Voting Rights Act Extension Passes US House Committee

May 10th, 2006

On May 10, the U.S. House Judiciary Committee passed HR 9, which extends the life of the federal Voting Rights Act. As passed by the Committee, the bill merely keeps the Act in existence, but does not amend it. The Voting Rights Act, passed in 1965, has been extraordinarily effective in protecting the rights of racial and ethnic minorities to register to vote. It has also helped racial and ethnic minorities to win elections, by making redistricting more favorable. Unfortunately, though, the Voting Rights Act has never been interpreted to help voters who would like to vote for independent candidates and small political parties.

On-Again, Off-Again “Unfaithful” Presidential Elector Loses Congressional Primary

May 10th, 2006

On May 9, West Virginia held primaries for the two major parties. Richie Robb lost his bid to become the Democratic nominee for U.S. House, 2nd district. He polled 30%, placing third in a 3-way race to oppose the Republican incumbent. Robb had been a Republican presidential elector candidate in 2004 (he had since switched parties). He had said, before the November 2004 election, that if elected to the Electoral College, that he would not vote for President Bush in the Electoral College. However, after he was elected to the Electoral College, he changed his mind and did vote for him.

Mountain Party Nominee for U.S. Senate

May 10th, 2006

West Virginia’s only ballot-qualified party, other than the Republican and Democratic Parties, is the Mountain Party. On May 9, it announced its nominees for public office this November. They include the party’s first nominee for U.S. Senate (the party has been on the ballot starting in 2000), Jesse Johnson. He will be the first minor party or independent candidate on the ballot for U.S. Senate from West Virginia since 2000, when a Libertarian ran for U.S. Senate.

Strayhorn Turns in 223,000 Signatures

May 9th, 2006

On May 9, gubernatorial candidate Carole Strayhorn turned in 223,000 signatures to meet the Texas independent petition requirement. She needed 45,253 valid signatures. She appears to have collected more signatures than any previous independent gubernatorial candidate in history.

The previous record (for independent gubernatorial candidates) was the 202,000 signatures in California collected for Mel Mason, Socialist Workers Party candidate for Governor in 1982, who was using the independent petition method. He needed 113,617 valid, but after California elections officials checked the petition, he was told he didn’t have enough valid.

Ohio Files Response to Independent Petition Deadline Case in US Supreme Court

May 9th, 2006

On March 8, Ohio filed a brief with the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing that that court should not accept the Ohio independent petition deadline case (for candidates for Congress). Lawrence v Blackwell, 05-1089. The brief argues that the U.S. Constitution requires that states treat all candidates equally, and that it would be unfair to Democrats and Republicans (who nominate for all office in March, in presidential years) if independents were permitted to submit their petitions later. Of course, the principle that all candidates must be treated equally is completely forgotten when Ohio decides how many signatures each candidate needs. Republicans and Democrats running for US House in Ohio each need 50 signatures, but independents need approximately 2,500 this year, and new parties need 56,280 signatures this year.

The US Supreme Court will probably decide whether to hear Lawrence v Blackwell in late June.

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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!

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    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]

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