Crying me a river: Ballot Access News » Blog Archive » All Statewide Minor Party Petitions in Pennsylvania Challenged

Ballot Access News » Blog Archive » All Statewide Minor Party Petitions in Pennsylvania Challenged: "An earlier blog post today said that a challenge had been filed to the statewide petition of the Pennsylvania Green Party. Since then, the Libertarian and Tea Party statewide petitions have also been challenged. See this story.
Tolerance for minor party and independent candidate election activity in Pennsylvania has drastically declined during the last 70 years. After 1938, and until 2004, no minor party or independent candidate statewide petition was ever challenged in Pennsylvania. But starting in 2004, such challenges have been filed every even-numbered election year in that state. A challenge to Libertarian Party presidential nominee Bob Barr was defeated in 2008, but challenges succeeded against Ralph Nader in 2004, and the Green Party statewide slate in 2006."

Here is my solution to this mess -- and I've been here and done that dance in the past.

If a challenge knocks the ONLY opponent off of the ballot, then the replace for that candidate is "NONE OF THE ABOVE."

If we had NONE OF THE ABOVE put onto the ballot, either by the force of a knock off or else as an automatic slot in all elections in PA -- then we'd be sure to have some choice and more competition for these elections.