Topic: Bob Barr
Barr Finally Fights For Texas

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Obama and McCain didn't file in time to be included on the Texas ballot, and Bob Barr is trying to make sure they aren't.

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by RS Davis
(libertarian)
Friday, September 19, 2008

 I reported earlier this month that the State Libertarian Executive Committee was voting on whether to approve actions against the Obama and McCain camps in Texas, who did not file for inclusion on the ballot on time.

According to this bit of the Texas election code, McCain and Obama had to file before the 70th day before the election:

192.031. PARTY CANDIDATE'S ENTITLEMENT TO PLACE ONBALLOT.

A political party is entitled to have the names of its nominees for president and vice-president of the United States placed on the ballot in a presidential general election if:

(1) the nominees possess the qualifications for those offices prescribed by federal law;
(2) before 5 p.m. of the 70th day before presidential election day, the party's state chair signs and delivers to the secretary of state a written certification of:

(A) the names of the party's nominees for president and vice-president; and
(B) the names and residence addresses of presidential elector candidates nominated by the party, in a number equal to the number of presidential electors that federal law allocates to this state; and

(3) the party is:

(A) required or authorized by Subchapter A of Chapter 172 to make its nominations by primary election; or
(B) entitled to have the names of its nominees placed on the general election ballot under Chapter 181.

The magic date was August 25th - Obama accepted the Democratic nomination on August 28th, and McCain accepted the GOP nomination on September 4th.

At the time I wrote the first piece, I had been informed by a LP insider that they were only one vote away from approval. Well, they got that approval, and on September 17th, the Barr campaign officially filed suit to get their names removed from the ballot.

Ironic, really, considering how often the major parties try to illegitimately keep America's third largest political party off ballots. In fact, the Libertarian Party once dubbed the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform bill the Incumbent Protection Act, because it made it very hard for someone to challenge all the free press that the incumbent gets, and virtually impossible for a third party candidate to mount a challenge.

The McCain Campaign has already taken action against the Barr Campaign last month, trying to have him removed from the Pennsylvania ballot:

On Monday, Victor P. Stabile, Cumberland County GOP chairman, on behalf of the John McCain campaign, filed with the court of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania a petition to have Bob Barr removed from the ballot in that state...Earlier today, the campaign received a copy of the suit which alleges that an intentional substitution violation of Pennsylvania law was committed as the Libertarian Party attempted to gain the 24,666 required signatures for inclusion on the ballot. The signature requirement for third party candidates and independents who seek ballot access in Pennsylvania is greater than TWELVE TIMES the number required for either the Democrats or the Republicans. The campaign and the state party were able to collect over 47,000 valid elector signatures since February, when this massive undertaking began.

This action flies in the face of election law. The Libertarian Party commented:

"The challenge to the substitution process is completely frivolous. It flies in the face of extremely well-established case law, as the McCain campaign and the Republican Party know full well, and may well be dismissed out of hand by the Commonwealth Court. The lack of moral integrity from the McCain campaign doesn't surprise me, but the sheer lameness of this tactic does. It shows how pathetically desperate the McCain campaign is to stop Bob Barr."

But in Texas, it is quite the opposite - instead of challenging existing law to keep someone from the ballot, the major candidates simply ignored election law and expected their status as political insiders of monopoly parties to carry them.

Thus far, it has. They are officially on the state ballots, but if the Barr campaign has its way, the battle for Texas will already have been won by the Libertarian candidate.

As I said before, if the court follows the law and removes them from the ballot, this de facto win would automatically give Bob Barr the 15% he needs to be included in the debates.

©2008 RS Davis, all rights reserved. You must have written permission from the author in order to republish this work.
Published: Friday, September 19, 2008
Last modified: Friday, September 19, 2008

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