The Colorado Libertarian Party plans to ask the State Court of Appeals to overturn a state law that lets qualified major parties decide for themselves whether to nominate newcomers to the party, yet forbids qualified minor parties the same freedom of choice. The law says no one can be nominated by a party if he or she has not been a member for a full year. But the law also says parties eligible for a primary may shorten that time period if they wish, while parties that nominate by convention may not.

Unity.08 is organizing to get as many high school students as possible to be present in polling places on November 7, 2006. They would ask all voters to sign this petition: “To the Congress of the United States: As We the People vote today, we are asking you to do your part and end the blame-game politics of Washington. Partisan bickering cannot solve the crucial issues we face. America deserves better.”

As this is non-partisan activity, and arguably educational, Unity.08 hopes to get the support of school administrators and teachers to cooperate with the plan. Otherwise, this activity could only be carried out in the hours during which school is not in session. For more information, see www.unitypetition.com.

On September 22, the 6th circuit issued a four-sentence opinion, denying injunctive relief to Charlie Morrison, who wanted to run as an independent candidate for US House in Ohio’s 15th district. He had enough valid signatures, but had voted in the Republican primary this year and had run for Republican Party county committee. Therefore, he had been denied a spot on the ballot on the grounds that he isn’t truly independent. Ohio does not have registration by party, and the law is vague about who may or may not qualify as an independent. Morrison v Colley, 06-4216. The court said a longer opinion will be issued later.

On September 21, the Illinois State Board of Elections finally certified Joe Parnarauskis for the ballot for State Senate, 52nd district (Urbana-Champaign). He appears to be the only minor party candidate for district office in Illinois this year who was able to survive a challenge. Democrats had challenged his petition. Even though that process showed he had enough, Democrats on the State Board of Elections had continued to block his certification. The only excuse was that some of his sheets had not shown “52nd State Senate district” at the top of the petition. However, all those sheets did contain that information in the first sentence below the heading. After a state court threatened to hold the Board in contempt if it did not certify Parnarauskis, the Board yielded.

Frank McKay, state chair of the New York Independence Party, and a foe of Lenora Fulani and her allies, has sent postal letters to the several thousand newly-elected Independence Party county committee members. As noted previously, the Fulani forces had recruited thousands of people to run for these Independence Party positions in New York city. A county organization that has elected committee members from a majority of precincts in that county cannot be dissolved by the state leadership of the party.

The McKay letter congratulates the newly-elected member, and then suggests that now the newly-elected member is obliged to do volunteer work for the party, ringing doorbells and doing other work. The letter also suggests that if the newly-elected member does not wish to do this work, he or she may return a form in the enclosed self-addressed stamped envelope, declining membership.

It is not yet known if this tactic will prevent the New York city county organizations from retaining enough members to be safe from dissolution.

On September 6, as has been noted, the Ohio Libertarian Party won a lawsuit in the 6th circuit. That court invalidated the procedure for new parties to get on the ballot, a petition of 1% of the last vote cast, due a year before the general election. Although there was no indication the state would ask for a rehearing, it had always been a possibility. However, the deadline for such a request has now passed, and the state made no such request.

Two significant election law changes made some time ago have just come to my awareness…South Dakota banned fusion in 1999, and no one who cares about this seems to have known about that. Also, in 2001, Vermont lowered the petition requirement for independent candidates for all statewide office (except president) from 1,000 signatures, to 250 signatures. It is not known why this happened.

The Libertarian Party of Vermont nominated nine candidates on September 13, 2006. Seven were running for the legislature and two for local office. Four of them mailed their acceptance forms on the morning of September 14. The deadline for the Secretary of State to receive these forms was September 15. Normally, all intra-Vermont postal mail is delivered in one day. However, in this case, none of the forms filed by the four arrived until September 16, and the Secretary of State is taking a hard-line position and denying them ballot access.

Three other Libertarians running for the legislature did not have deadline problems. They include two with the label “Libertarian, Republican” and one with the label “Libertarian”. Among the four legislative candidates who are being denied ballot status, three will still be on the ballot, but as “Republican” instead of the desired label “Libertarian, Republican”.

The Libertarian Party will continue to be a ballot-qualified party in Vermont. Vermont determines party status by whether it is organized in 10 towns, not on how many votes it polls or how many candidates it runs. Thanks to Hardy Machia for correcting the original version of this post (with his comment below). The party has not had any intent to run any statewide nominees this year.

On September 20, the US House of Representatives passed HR 4844, by Henry Hyde (R-Il.). It would require everyone to present a government-issued photo ID before voting at the polls, effective in 2008. By 2010, such ID must also be of a type that certifies the holder is a citizen. The vote was 228-196. The bill also requires states to provide such ID free.

U.S. District Court Judge Martha Vasquez upheld New Mexico ballot access procedures for minor parties, in a decision dated September 18 but not released until September 20. The decision is Libertarian Party of New Mexico v Vigil-Giron, 06-0615. The law requires one petition to qualify a new party, and then separate petitions for each of its nominees (after they have been nominated). No other state except Pennsylvania requires the nominees of a qualified party to submit petitions.

As a result, New Mexico will be the only state in the western half of the nation to have a Democratic-Republican ballot monopoly on all the statewide races.

Judge Vazquez seems not to have understood the New Mexico law. One of the plaintiffs’ strongest point is that New Mexico does not require nominee petitions for president. Yet, presidential ballots tend to have more candidates (around the nation in general) than ballots for other office. The opinion doesn’t seem to acknowledge that New Mexico doesn’t require nominee petitions for president. The judge cited the fact that there were 10 candidates for president in 1992, but that happened because an earlier law permitted old minor parties to be on the ballot for president (but no other office) even though they had never had to submit any signatures, nor meet any vote test.

The judge also misunderstood the New Mexico law on how a party attains major party status. She said that a major party is one that polled 5% of the statewide presidential or gubernatorial vote, for any of its nominees. Actually, the state says a major party must have polled 5% for governor or president.

The worst aspect of the decision is that the judge refused to allow any factual evidence to be presented in the case. Plaintiffs had intended to show that a majority of New Mexico legislative elections are consistently one-candidate elections. The judge wrote that no possible facts would be relevant. Her action contradicts several U.S. Supreme Court opinions, which say that judges must gather and analyze facts. Storer v Brown said, “There is no litmus test” to know whether a ballot access law is constitutional; the analysis depends on facts. Anderson v Celebrezze emphasized this even more strongly.

Another piece of evidence that the judge never heard is that no state has had fewer minor party and independent candidates on the ballot for US Senate and Governor (in the period 1980-2006) than New Mexico.