A bill has been introduced in the Georgia state House that would eliminate all petitioning requirements for third party and independent candidates for local and statewide offices. This news comes to us from Voter GA, a grassroots election-reform organization in Georgia.

House Bill 1257 would save Georgia taxpayers money by eliminating the need to pay state employees to verify petition signatures.

Ballot-access expert Richard Winger, a Free & Equal board member, said Georgia has the most restrictive ballot-access law in the country for minor-party candidates for U.S. Congress. Unqualified parties need signatures equal to 5 percent of registered voters in the given Congressional district to get on the ballot. As a result, no minor party has met this requirement since the law was passed in 1943, Winger said.

If the bill passes, Georgia would have some of the more free and equal ballot-access laws in the country. But the bill is expected to encounter opposition from the General Assembly leadership and the duopoly in both chambers of the legislature.

It’s now up to House Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Mark Hamilton to determine if the bill will get a hearing. A similar, but far less comprehensive measure, HB 1141, was removed from the hearing schedule last week.

In other news …

Where’s Christina Tobin?

Free & Equal Founder and Chairwoman Christina Tobin was on Reality Report with Gary Franchi on March 10 to speak about California’s Top Two Primary proposal, Proposition 14, and the upward momentum of The Free & Equal Elections Foundation.

On March 12, Tobin was the opening speaker at the annual Students for Sensible Drug Policy International Conference in San Francisco. Look for the video to be posted soon on freeandequal.org.

Also on March 12, Tobin spoke about Free & Equal’s efforts around the country on Antiwar Radio.