The New-Gazette.com

Thursday May 10, 2007

Next time, the federal appeals court is just going to have to write the law on ballot access for the Illinois General Assembly. The Legislature, it appears, can't be trusted to do it right.

Last year the appeals court declared that Illinois' unusually stringent signature requirements for independent political candidates running for the Legislature were unconstitutional. Illinois required that independents gather signatures equaling 10 percent of the vote in the last general election. No other state, the court said, demands more than 5 percent.

According to the Illinois Green Party, no state besides Illinois, Georgia or Alabama has a signature requirement greater than 2 percent of the last vote cast. So what is the Legislature doing to make amends? It appears that a bill to set the standard at 5 percent will win approval.

A bill sponsored by Sen. Mike Frerichs, D-Gifford, which would have set a much lower standard of about one-fourth of 1 percent of the last vote cast, won approval in the Senate 53-0. But that apparently was just for show. As Senate Bill 733 moved to the House it was assigned to the Executive Committee, instead of the Elections Committee. That's a sign that it is destined to die without action. Meanwhile House Bill 632, with the more demanding signature requirement for independents, sailed through the House and appears to be on the fast track in the Senate. We haven't heard any bellyaching from anyone in the Legislature, Democrat or Republican, about the higher standard.

Who says Illinois Republicans and Democrats can't get along? When it comes to marginalizing independent candidates who could be a threat to the two-party system, they're about the same.

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