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* A Champaign News-Gazette editorial rails today against a recent change to state law on candidate petitions…
Our legislators have front-loaded the process to ensure that a public galvanized by events can’t take quick action to seek change at the polls. Candidates for public office recently started distributing nominating petitions - the filing period is Nov. 28 through Dec. 5 (an earlier version had the wrong filing date information) - for a general election that won’t be held until November 2012.
What’s the rush? No rush — it’s just the politics-as-usual crowd writing rules that reinforce the status quo.
Those deadlines are actually for nominating petitions for the March primary, and not the November general.
* The paper is also upset at the new limit on petition signatures…
To get around challenges to their voter petitions, many candidates collect far more signatures than they need. For starters, it’s intended to demonstrate public support. More important, the extra signatures provide a margin for error if some voter signatures are challenged and found wanting.
But for every move, there is a countermove. To prevent the filing of extra signatures, legislators passed a law limiting how many extra signatures a candidate can file.
This is real inside baseball, the kind of thing average voters never think about.
But professional politicians have made a science of this kind of gamesmanship, and they write the rules to give them an advantage. This change in the law has little, if anything, to do with improving the democratic process, But it has much to do with attempting to restrict ballot access by making it easier for one candidate to challenge an opponent’s petitions.
Yes, it will likely be easier to kick a candidate off the ballot with the new limits. No longer can a state House candidate submit thousands of signatures and overwhelm the opposition’s checkers. The law requires a minimum of 500 valid signatures for House races. Now, the law will also include a maximum of 1,500.
…Adding… I should’ve noted that overwhelming the opposition’s checkers with thousands of signatures is what incumbents usually do after staff finds out that the original sigs are insufficient. That doesn’t usually happen so much with challengers. The round-tabling is most often done by amateur challengers, however.
On the other hand, it also means that a candidate can’t stand in front of a mall, supermarket, L station, or whatever and collect thousands of invalid signatures from people who aren’t registered to vote in their district - or round-table a ton of fraudulent sigs. This new law means that candidates will have to focus on going door-to-door to get those signatures. That’s not necessarily a bad thing.
In the big picture, 500 valid signatures is not that big of a deal. Any legitimate candidate can do this without an extraordinary effort.
* In other news, the Tribune today has a story headlined “Gambling bill would weaken state’s regulatory muscle, critics fear.” From the piece…
With the state’s 10 current casinos, Illinois has one regulator for every 92 gambling positions. If the gaming board finishes an effort to fill current vacancies, that ratio will drop to one for every 61 positions — twice as strong as the next closest state.
With expansion, the gaming board said it needs 292 more regulators, which would increase its budget from $54.6 million to at least $106 million — $43 million more than any other state.
That hiring would keep Illinois’ regulatory staff at one for every 81 gambling positions if the state reaches 39,200 positions. Illinois still would rank No. 1 among the nation’s top gambling states.
If, on the other hand, the state were to add all the casino gambling positions without new hires, it would have one regulator for every 306 positions. Only Nevada would have a weaker ratio.
Not mentioned is that a bunch of these new positions would go to existing casinos. It’s not clear why the Gaming Board would need a huge number of new regulators for those slots.
Also, the Board doesn’t seem to be in any big rush to fill its job vacancies right now, so one might assume that this issue is not its highest priority.
* And the Bloomington Pantagraph has an editorial today about the remap…
If the League of Women Voters of Illinois succeeds in its legal challenge of the legislative district boundaries drawn after the 2010 census, Illinoisans might finally get the non-gerrymandered, non-artisan maps they deserve.
We are not holding our breath.
The league is challenging the map as a violation of the First Amendment, arguing that the partisan way in which the districts are drawn interferes with the public’s constitutional rights to speak, assemble and petition the government. It’s a strong argument, but one that hasn’t won judicial favor — yet.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court, notes that the resolutions concerning the redistricting plans specifically state that the partisan composition of each district is taken into account.
I’ve seen good arguments for and against this idea. We’ve discussed it before, but I’m curious to hear what you think now.
posted by Rich Miller
Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 10:27 am
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Nominating petitions should be done away with altogether. The cost/time to pass petitions, defend challenges, etc, is just another deterrant for qualified candidates getting their names on the ballot.
Comment by Frank Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 10:43 am
–If the gaming board finishes an effort to fill current vacancies, that ratio will drop to one for every 61 positions — twice as strong as the next closest state.
“If” is a powerful word. If more regulators are so important in keeping the industry square, why haven’t the vacancies been filled? Isn’t that Jaffe’s beef on expansion, that the board won’t have enough oversight?
Comment by wordslinger Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 10:45 am
Gathering valid signatures will be troublesome for outsiders under the new rules. The problem will be that each circulator will need to make sure that each signer is actually a registered voter at their current address. You would be shocked at how many people who say they are registered are not actually registered, and further how many are not registered at their current residence.
If you gather signatures door-to-door you can work off of a street ordered list of registered voters, but what if you gather them at a place where you work or a social gathering with friends. Many will sign who don’t want to admit that they are not registered.
This is going to end badly for some well-intentioned candidates.
Comment by Cassiopeia Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 10:47 am
Very funny collection
Chambana — voter suppression capitol of IL — worries about candidates and petitions
Foot Draggin’ Aaron worries his militia — didn’t he hire 75 more cops for the so far non operational video poker plague?
And the LWV Sleepy Heads…..the remap process took place in the Spring. see ya in 2021!
Comment by CircularFiringSquad Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 10:52 am
First, what an embarassing error by the Champaign News - Gazette.
Second, what is missing from the discussion on petitions is that candidates could still collect thousands of signatures and before turning them in sit down and really go over the signatures, cross out the bad ones, keep the good ones, and turn in a solid group.
Comment by Just Observing Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 11:09 am
I don’t like maximum signature limits. Never have. I see it as just another tool for the insider, particularly since there are rules that limit voters to signing only one candidate’s petition per office. But maybe fewer candidates will knock on my door on Sunday afternoons this fall when I am watching my football.
Comment by Jake From Elwood Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 11:12 am
Agree with “Just Observing”
The focus on petitions had been quantity rather thatn quality. I’d argue that benefits the established candidates who at a moment’s notice can flood a district to get signatures.
This might, heaven forbid, bring quality into the picture. and, in the case of House races, you can still turn in three times as many as are actually needed. that seems to be more than enough of a buffer.
Comment by Michelle Flaherty Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 11:28 am
Regarding the LWV map challenge, where have they been for the last 30 years?
Comment by Dead Head Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 11:39 am
The League’s 1st Amendment Challenge to the map as described in the Pantagraph editorial sounds weak.
If the Court’s going to throw out partisan gerrymandering on the grounds it interferes with the public’s rights to address/petition their government, why not throw out the electoral college or uphold bans on corporate donations to campaigns that interfere similarly with an individual’s right to address/petition their government?
Comment by hisgirlfriday Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 11:39 am
“… there are rules that limit voters to signing only one candidate’s petition per office.”
There are? I’m not aware of any except across party lines.
Comment by MikeMacD Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 11:39 am
MikeMacD, yes, there are. And that really comes into play in Latino districts when incumbents use their power to get as many sigs as early as possible. Since there aren’t that many registered voters, it leaves opponents outta luck. So, there’s another good reason to support this change.
Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 11:42 am
I have not read the lawsuit, first off. But I’m familiar with a lot of the basic arguments. I’d be curious if it engaged the question below.
Here’s my question: is LoWV more concerned with -collective- representation, or -dyadic- representation? To be jargony, dyadic representation is to look at each district, one by one, and to treat it as the sole unit of concern. Assuming that there is also some inherent merit to preserving traditional, “tight” geographic boundaries (a key assumption), then yes, arguably the Democratic map is going to lead to a lot of Republicans downstate and in the nearby suburbs getting worse representation than they would otherwise. Maybe their “speech rights,” to be a dominant majority in their particular local communities, is indeed getting suppressed.
On the other hand … the -collective- population of Illinois, arguably gets better representation under the gerrymandered Democratic map. The reason is simple: there are just more Democrats than Republicans in Illinois - so you might think a “fair” map would have more Democrats than Republicans in our DC House delegation. But the Dems tend to be heavily clustered just in that northeast corner of the state. So if you drew a bunch of “compact” districts, you’d create some hyper-Democratic districts in the northeast corner. But outside of Cook, you might see a lot more Republicans, albeit with narrower partisan balances of control.
The net result of more compact districts, could easily be a statewide mismatch: more actual Democrats in Illinois, but more GOP representatives in the US House. Dyadic: good. Collective: arguably worse.
So which counts: the “speech rights” of individuals within particular districts, viewed only from that local geographic perspective, or the “speech rights” of Democrats across Illinois, to have a statewide delegation that is more or less proportional to the number of Democrats in Illinois?
I’m not sure you can have both. But the concept of gerrymandering is more democratically (small d) defensible than its critics are sometimes willing to admit. The “problem,” if it is one, is that Democrats just clump together these days in big cities! I’m not sure it’s any more fair to create some hyper-compact “Democratic ghettos” around Cook, in the name of speech rights.
Comment by ZC Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 11:43 am
Well, I guess you do learn something new every day.
Comment by MikeMacD Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 11:47 am
Rich - not so fast on MikeMacD. The Election Code limits people to one Independent per office, and to signing a single established party’s petitions, but there isn’t an Election Code limit on how many (for example) Demorcatic candidates for a particular office a person wishes to sign for.
Also, the “good government” arguement is a bit off. Most of the new maximums are for offices as to which the county clerk doesn’t handle any petition challenge (i.e. they’re offices for which the State BOard is the body to hear the objections).
Comment by titan Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 11:50 am
So, um, I didn’t learn something new today?
Seriously though, how would someone’s signature on say two Democratic petitions for the same office be resolved if there was a restriction to doing this. Signatures are not dated. Would you throw the signatures out for both? If you keep one, which one?
Comment by MikeMacD Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 12:10 pm
The pages are dated when notarized Mike. The first sheet notarized wins.
Comment by 47th Ward Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 12:16 pm
I think the problem with the limits is it limits how many can be turned in and not how many can be collected.
The people who used to go out early and clear the field are still going to do it. They will collect 5000. They will turn in 1500. And 3500 people will refuse to sign for the second guy because they already signed for the first.
Comment by Skeeter Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 12:32 pm
The other very local problem is for Chicago Committeeman. The ward map is not done. Tough to gather when you don’t know the borders.
Comment by Skeeter Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 12:35 pm
Sorry to belabor the point but petitions are in the field and it would be nice to do it right. All I see in [10 ILCS 5/7-10] is:
- A “qualified primary elector” of a party may not sign petitions for or be a candidate in the primary of more than one party. -
Which is what my understanding is. If I’m wrong please correct me.
Comment by MikeMacD Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 1:03 pm
It’s an interesting dichotomy that as politics gets more hyper-partisan the arguments in the courts try to make them less partisan based upon the constitution. Given the strained “originalist” interpretations from the ultra-conservatives on the Supreme Court it’s fascinating to speculate where they would land on the issue. Tom DeLay’s Texas early-in-the-decade gerrymander was upheld by the USSC for the most part. Though that was a Republican case, it would be hard for them to legitimately flip flop on these arguments.
Comment by D.P. Gumby Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 1:06 pm
MikeMac-
Candidates have been bounced in petition challenges just in the manner as Rich and 47th have described. Whatever you have cited is just another vague section of the Election Code that can be read either way when a particular outcome is more convenient politically.
Comment by Jake From Elwood Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 1:39 pm
There should be more penalties for nominating petition challenges that fail. Enforcing the existing rules on bad faith legal complaints would be a good place to start.
If you lose an election by one vote or more, if you demand a recount and lose, you have to pay your opponents legal bills, even if you had a strong case for wanting a second counting of the ballots.
But if you file a harassing challenge to nominating petitions, that includes bad-faith objection after bad-faith objection, there are no adverse consequences.
Why? Challenges primarily serve to protect incumbents.
And that government seems to want to preserve the prerogative to cheat in close elections without ever having to be challenged in a recount.
Comment by Carl Nyberg Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 2:27 pm
=== there are no adverse consequences.===
Yeah, I think there are.
Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 2:30 pm
There are adverse consequences, but only for the most blatant violators. There was a big one a few years ago but I do not recall the particulars.
Comment by Jake From Elwood Friday, Sep 16, 11 @ 2:36 pm