A ruling from the 11th Circuit Court on Wednesday requires a Georgia district court to consider whether Libertarian Party of Georgia candidates have been unconstitutionally excluded by the state’s ballot access requirements.
Georgia law currently requires thousands of signatures and a petition to the Secretary of State before qualifying for ballot access. Gathering signatures can be a costly restriction – and Democrats and Republicans are not required to do so. A statement from the Libertarian Party of Georgia notes that even in races where a Democrat or Republican is not running against an incumbent, no third party or independent can serve as a challenger – 60 percent of Georgia General Assembly incumbents ran unopposed in 2018.
The Libertarians filed a request for injunctive relief back in March, when social distancing guidelines from the CDC made collecting signatures door-to-door impossible – both legally and morally. The Libertarians noted that other parties are also impacted and that ballot access barriers “violated their associational rights under the 1st and 14th Amendments and their Equal Protection rights under the 14th Amendment.” Libertarian candidates are being denied the right to run for office and voters are disenfranchised when chosen candidates are blocked from appearing on ballots.
“Today’s ruling from the Court of Appeals means that the Secretary of State is going to have to justify a ballot-access scheme that has deprived Georgia voters of choice in congressional elections for more than 70 years,” said Bryan Sells, the attorney for the Libertarian Party and its co-plaintiffs in both suits.
“Most voters are disgusted with their political choices, up and down the ballot,” said Laura Williams, vice chair for the Libertarian Party of Georgia. “Georgia’s ballot access rules were made in the 1940s expressly to make sure the U.S. Communist Party could not run candidates, and Republicans and Democrats have conspired to keep everyone else off, too.”
The lead plaintiff in the suit was Martin Cowen, Georgia resident and the most recent of more than two dozen candidates to try and fail to meet the signature requirement for candidacy for the U.S. House.
“The two-party system consistently delivers terrible candidates, and in Georgia, most races are actually single-party. 82% of Georgia Assembly races are Uncontested – Rs and Ds won’t even run against each other,” added Williams. “Corporate parties select state Representatives by keeping competitors off the ballot – voters literally have no choice, and no voice. The Libertarian Party went to bat not just for our right to run as a third choice, but for the rights of the fourth and fifth parties, and more choices, whomever they may be.”
You can read the full ruling here: Martin Cowen, et al. v. Georgia Secretary of State, No. 19-14065
