minionofmidas
Lewis Trondheim
Atlas Institution
Posts: 58,206
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« Reply #2 on: August 23, 2008, 05:33:17 AM » |
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This is Article V, Section 1, Clause 8 of our worthy Constitution:
"Any political party of five or more members is considered to be an organized political party. The benefits of being an organized political party may be determined by the Senate by appropriate legislation."
Section 1 is clearly unconstitutional insofar as it applies to parties of five members or above*. Section 2 is similar to earlier proposals not to list minor parties on the ballot, ie to list one-man-parties as Independents - an issue I couldn't care less about either way, and that doesn't even require a law - it can be addressed by SoFAs by amending the Candidate Regulations (unless I overlooked something). It goes further by making it impossible to join a party before the elections just in order to mislead uninformed voters (although I wonder if any of our voters can be misled by that. For order of lower pref.s maybe.) or just to rile that party's members.
I don't see the need in that, but I don't see the harm either. I see the constitutional isse with the official contact in case of recognized parties that don't have one (but have over 5 members, whether grandfathered ones under Section 3 or new ones because Section 1 is unconstitutional), though. And I see the critical issue of the *timing* of contacts' declarations. Absentee Voting Booths open right upon the Candidate Declaration Deadline, and parties typically hold primaries (if they bother with them) after the Candidate Declaration Deadline. The Supreme Court, in its infinite wisdom whatever has recently ruled that ... strike that. I haven't the slightest clue what they ruled exactly. I don't think they do, either. ... anyhow, they found that absentee voters have a right to broadly - but not exactly - the same information as regular voters. (Rant suppressed. I'd really like to see Sam's promised concurrence one day, though)
Not that this bill even states that the declarations have to be made before the regular vote opens.
So, bottom line: Badly drafted bill. No idea how to rectify, exactly. No pressing need, either. Kill.
I motion to table this legislation.
*weird aside: it is worth noting that membership in a political party is not defined in the Constitution or afaik anywhere in law, though - what the SoFA keeps a count of is technically a person's "political affiliation": Article V, Section II, Clause 1 and, with the same wording, the VIth Amendment, state "In registration, the person must state their name** and State of fantasy residence; In addition, they may optionally state a political affiliation". However, the two concepts have been commonly held to be identical.
**I've always marvelled at the idiotic *requirement* to restate your name, btw. Thankfully, precedent has largely been to ignore it.
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