On May 25, the Green Party and the Constitution Party filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court against Georgia’s procedure for placing newly-qualifying parties on the ballot for President. The case is Green Party of Georgia v State of Georgia and Brian Kemp, 1:12-cv-1822, northern district.
Georgia requires a petition of 50,334 valid signatures and requires each sheet to be notarized. No statewide petition for either a newly-qualifying party or a statewide independent candidate has succeeded in Georgia since 2000. In 1985 the 11th circuit ruled in Bergland v Harris that states must be more lenient on ballot access for president than for other office, and that Jenness v Fortson doesn’t necessarily apply to presidential candidate procedures. Georgia is in the 11th circuit.
There is now a constitutional ballot access case underway in all of the states with the worst ballot access procedures, except for Indiana and Texas. Cases are pending in Alabama, California, Georgia, Illinois, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee. All of these cases are being handled by attorneys who are not charging for their services. The ballot access movement owes a huge debt of gratitude to these attorneys, who include Dan Johnson of Illinois, David Sapp of the Southern California ACLU, Mike Raffauf of Georgia, Roberta Price and David Urias of New Mexico, Gary Sinawski of New York, Bob Bastress of West Virginia, Jason Huber of North Carolina, Mark Brown of Ohio, Alan Woodruff of Tennessee, and Oliver Hall of Washington, D.C.
There are other constitutional ballot access pending in states not named above. The list above is not intended to be a complete list of such cases, but rather to highlight the cases against the most restrictive states. Six states are responsible for 60% of the total national number of signatures needed to place a new party or independent presidential candidate on the ballot in the entire nation (this calculation uses the easier method to get on the ballot in each state). Progress against those six states will do much to help voters of the entire United States. Those six states are California, Texas, Oklahoma, North Carolina, Georgia, and Indiana.
Which of the helpful lawyers has ANY brain cells regarding —
Separate is NOT equal.
Brown v. Bd of Ed 1954 — overruling about 58 years of EVIL UN-equal racial segregation cases.
—
i.e. each election is NEW.
EQUAL ballot access tests for all candidates for the same office in the same election area.
EQUAL as in 14th Amdt, Sec. 1 – EQUAL Protection Clause – EPC.
ALL of the SCOTUS ballot access cases have been screwed up since 1968.
Too many LAZY lawyers since 1868 (repeat 1868) who never have looked at the TWO main speeches about the 14th Amdt in 1866 — along with the super-morons on SCOTUS and the SCOTUS super-moron clerks.
i.e. the IGNORANT SCOTUS putting its JUNK on paper for decades and decades.
We talk about minor and third-party candidates… What’s we truly have are two OLD parties that have failed us, we need to look to NEW parties to help guide us towards the future… this year I’m voting for a NEW party!
Out with the old and in with the new…
Demo Rep is mistaken on his analysis of what”equal” means. The position of existing parties in relationship to parties trying to get on the ballot for the first time are not equal. Existing parties do not have to get 50,000 signatures to get on the ballot each year. The rules are written by the existing parties to limit competition.
The other requirements beyond the gathering of signatures are the manner in which the signatures must be gathered. In Texas, the Secretary of State requires that legal sized paper must be used and that parties must verify in advance of turning in the signatures that each voter is a valid voter by consulting local Voter Registration databases such as in Harris County, the state’s most populous, that do allow you to retrieve the age of the voter unless one goes into the registrars office. Almost no state allows for electronic signatures where a voter could log into the Secretary of State’s Website and sign the petition for the party trying to get on the ballot.
There are other provision of the law that apply to this issue such as Article Four, “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government”. If I can’t vote for a candidate nominated by a party of my own choice, a Republican (Representative) form of government does not exist.
The case of Smith v. Allwright recognized that the nomination process is as important as the final vote for the candidates who appear on the ballot. I would argue that nominating the candidates is more important than the vote we now have to approve or vote against the choices that others have presented to us. As Plumkett of Tammany Hall said, “You let me do he nominating and you can do the electing.”
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# 3 SCOTUS with its 9 appointed robot party hacks can not detect the equal in 14th Amdt, Sec. 1.
Equal nominating petitions for ALL candidates for the same office in the same election area at every election.
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Finally a concerted effort to allow all citizens to be represented by individuals chosen by the people they wish to represent. The two party system has been flawed for some time including its failure to pursue ethical campaign finance reform measures and fair elections. I applaud those ready to defend the rights of citizens to be led by their peers who will look out for their best interests not those of lobbyist.
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I do not understand how people can always be so obtuse.
There is no grace in people any more. People are increasingly
mean-spirited and we cannot solve problems of any type
until we can cooperate. We can disagree, certainly,
but we still are obligated to make choices and get the job done.