Should NM get rid of candidate petitions?
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Interesting story posted by Milan Simonich of the Texas-New Mexico Newspapers Partnership:
State Sen. Howie Morales wants to outlaw nominating petitions, the system now used by major-party candidates to qualify for primary election ballots.
Morales plans to introduce a bill next year to do away with the petition system, which he considers flawed and outdated.
“We should just have candidates pay a filing fee to be on the ballot. I’m going to carry legislation along those lines,” said Morales, a Democrat from Silver City and a former county clerk.
This past spring, one of the biggest snafus in New Mexico political history (and that’s saying something) was avoided after the state Supreme Court allowed Roundhouse and statewide candidates (many of them longtime veterans in the state legislature) to have their names appear on ballots even though they had filled out nominating petitions incorrectly.
Under state law, candidates are required to submit signatures to the Secretary of State’s Office to qualify for the ballot.
Instead of having to collect signatures, some states simply have candidates pay a filing fee to get on the primary and/or general election ballots.
The fees vary by state. It’s as expensive as $7,500 for Republican state Senate races in Arkansas and as low as $2 for state House races in New Hampshire. Click here to look at the state-by-state breakdown.
“It would really be smart” to make the change, Simonich quotes Richard Winger, editor of California-based Ballot Access News. “The government gets the revenue and does not have to spend money for checking petitions or for challenges.”
Posted under Capitol Report.
Tags: Ballot Access News, Howie Morales, Milan Simonich, Richard Winger, Texas New Mexico Newspapers Partnership
2:30 pm on July 27th, 2012
I’d support changing it, or at least make it a level playing field for those of us Independent candidates who are required to get 3X as many signatures as those in political parties. I doubt the Parties will support a change because they are able to control elections by making it more difficult for those who do not run under their banners.
Also if you’re interested in changing the culture of our Congress consider a video commentary I did back in 2010 Congress Contract with the American People.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zt095JyIrbA
3:58 pm on July 27th, 2012
I do not think it is unreasonable or even a bad idea to require that candidates properly fill out a form or gather a reasonable number of signatures. In NM, the requirement is only 1% of the previous cycle’s voter turnout for independent candidate petitions. If a candidate can’t gather 3000 signatures, I don’t think they deserve to be a candidate plus being out in the public is a potentially huge benefit if the candidate is well organized and can motivate volunteers to gather signatures for them. I personally can gather around 50 sigs an hour and it is a great way to initiate conversations about the candidate and the issues.
On the other hand, a NH style model would not be objectionable except that NH has open primaries and NM does not so the major parties have a decided advantage. This does not, however, address the underlying issue of removing money from politics. If a candidate wishes to receive public financing, (which I fully support) they will have to gather 5$ contributions from lots of folks anyway so gathering signatures to qualify for the ballot does not seem like that much of an extra burden.
This article completely ignores the fact that there currently 3 minor parties (NMIP, Green and Libertarian) in NM and minor parties, once they have qualified for the ballot and garnered 1% of the vote, do not have to gather signatures. They just have to convince the party to nominate them.
4:04 pm on July 27th, 2012
I agree for the most part but for the fact I see a potential problem of many filing for an office to the point of having too many names on a ballot to have a good election. Perhaps it might be best to have a combination of the two, a fee to file for the office and then those who are able to get the most signatures on petitions be included on the ballot so that there is more of a choice in who to vote for. For example, in the coming election for president, so far we have only a choice of Obama or Romney and we need a third or fourth party candidate to give us other choices. Gary Johnson is getting support and donations to be on the ballot but it will be a shame if he is not able to “jump through the hoops” and present another alternative to those candidates who have billions to spend on this election.
10:41 am on July 28th, 2012
There are at least three ballot qualified minor party candidates here in NM: Rocky Anderson on the NMIP ticket, Dr. Jill Stein on the Green party ticket and The aforementioned Gary Johnson as a Libertarian.
11:14 am on July 28th, 2012
That is great because it gives a bit more of a choice and it also can be an indication of who might be considered as a VP. For example, using the underdogs for an example, if Johnson were to get on the ballot he has the option of picking Stein or Anderson as potential VP if he likes how their positions match his own
10:21 am on July 29th, 2012
Gary, Jill and Rocky all have running mates but I also think there should be more cooperation between minor parties. I know that there are pretty vociferous arguments against allowing parlimentarianism to creep into our oh so pure representative democracy but I think these arguments are spurious at this point considering both major parties are traded like stocks.
1:50 pm on July 29th, 2012
About time. I will be supporting Howie Morales in his endeavor to move this foward-thinking bit of legislation through the Roundhaus.
8:38 am on August 14th, 2012
I dont see why the government has to make it so hard for anyone to get their name on a ballot considering the only requirements to get on there now is raise or spend 5000 on a campaign. now they expect us to pay in order to get our names on the ballot. You should have to have to pay for something that is our right as us citizens. There are no requirements as to anything other than the age of 35. I think every citizen has the right to run for what ever office they want free of fees the way it was ment to be run. If you think that being charged for something that is our right to pursue is fine then why not side with the rest of the government the rest of the leeway they need to finish taking everything else away from us as that is what the currant form of government are trying to do. What happened to this being a free country or did that go out the window when they started changing the constitution and bill of rights along with the decleration of independance. we need to do away with all this petty bullshit and get our country back to being run like our founding fathers intended for it to be run…