Massachusetts has three ballot-qualified parties, Democratic, Republican, and Libertarian. Massachusetts is holding a special primary for U.S. Senate on December 8, 2009. No one qualified for the Libertarian Party primary, but election officials were forced by state law to print up Libertarian Party primary ballots anyway. See this story.
In theory, Libertarian registrants, and independents (who are permitted to choose the Libertarian primary ballot) could write-in someone. But, state law says no one can be nominated at a primary unless he or she polls a number of write-ins equal to 10% of the party’s registration (or, alternatively, a number of write-ins equal to the number of signatures needed to get on the primary ballot, whichever is less). Thus, anyone who wanted the Libertarian nomination would need approximately 1,300 write-ins. UPDATE: the original post contains an error. The part of the law letting Libertarians nominate someone by write-in vote is worse than originally described. Anyone winning the Libertarian nomination would have needed 10,000 write-ins.
No Libertarian qualified to get on the Libertarian primary ballot because that would have taken 10,000 signatures, and only registered Libertarians, and registered independents, may sign. Instead, a Libertarian Party dues-paying member who is a registered independent, Joseph Kennedy, qualified as an independent candidate for the special general election, which will be on January 19, 2010. Kennedy needed 10,000 signatures to qualify for the January election, but any registered voter was free to sign.
Massachusetts does not require write-in candidates to file a declaration of write-in candidacy, except for President. Therefore, in theory, any person who wanted the Libertarian nomination could have been conducting a write-in campaign beneath the radar of the Libertarian Party, and even beneath the radar of the media. However, it is very unlikely that anyone is actually doing this.
The Democratic primary ballot as four candidates, and the Republican primary ballot has two candidates.
How about the Rainbow Greens get behind him too since he’s an independent?
Have candidates / incumbents fill vacancies via a rank order list.
NO more high cost low turnout special elections for vacancies.
P.R. and A.V. — ONE election per year.
Tyranny begins when annual elections end — a very OLD comment.
CT used to survive with elections each 6 months.
Now lots of the gerrymander monsters in the States are trying to get longer and longer terms — some regimes now have 4 year terms even for state reps. — lots of time for them to become arrogant powermad.
Wait, never mind. He is opposed to same sex marriage.
Since it appears the choice will only be between a Democrat, a Republican and this independent, it might be worth asking where the other two candidates stand on same sex marriage. A one issue litmus test may not be in your best interest — in this particular case. Then again it might be. I am just posing the obvious question.
I think we should have a referendum on whether left-handed people ought to be able to intermarry.
I am not a Libertarian. But how do Libertarians ever expect their party to grow if they don’t run candidates for office – even when there is no chance the candidate will win?
Several years ago in Alabama, the Libertarian Party polled enough votes for one of its nominees in a General Election, that resulted in the party qualifying to hold a party primary for nominating candidates for office in the next election cycle. But instead of using this “forum” that would have gotten exposure for the party as well as its candidates, the party instead opted to hold a “nominating convention” and “hand pick” their nominees.
3rd parties – when they do qualify for holding a primary election – should take advantage of such. For by holding a primary, it gets voters accustomed to seeing the party hold its own primary and exposing the voters not only to the party but to its candidates.
To a limited extend, the American Independent Party in California is guilty of doing the same thing. Party leaders should encourage “warm bodies” who are members of the party and who subscribe to the party’s doctrine to make themselves available for nomination. By having at least two candidates for the same office in a 3rd party primary, this draws attention to the party and to its candidates that it otherwise would never get.
American voters are accustomed to candidates being nominated at primaries. When 3rd parties do otherwise – when they have the primary option – it smacks of the old days of the “smoke-filled back rooms.”
Richard- If 1300 voters wrote in Joseph Kennedy in the Libertarian primary could he receive the LP nomination in addition to being an independent candidate?
#7 asks a very good question. I tend to think the answer is “yes”. Massachusetts allows fusion in cases when the candidate wins the nomination of a party that he or she isn’t a member of, via write-ins at the primary. So I tend to think Kennedy would then be on the general election ballot as “Independent, Libertarian.”
That question seems interesting enough that the LP in Massachusetts might want to try doing it.
After re-reading the initial post, (and as I wipe egg off my face) I now understand better why the party did not field candidates in the primary. Still, at the risk of contradicting my original reply, I wonder if being listed as “Independent-Libertarian” rather than just “Independent” would cost Mr. Kennedy votes. While running under a 3rd party label is better than not being listed on the ballot at all, I still content that the “Independent” label (whether as a “straight-out independent” or as a party label with the word Independent) does not scare voters and makes them more likely to vote for the candidate.
So could a person conduct a write in campaign for the Libertarian Party primary election, win that primary, and then be placed as a Libertarian Party candidate on the ballot for the general election without having gathered any petition signatures?
Joe Kennedy is legally prohibited from being listed as a Libertarian Party candidate on the ballot. He ran as an independent but the state allows him to chose a political designation and he chose Liberty Party.