Ballot Access Summary

The Natural Law Party and its candidates are now officially on the ballot in Ohio, Colorado, and Nevada (see sidebar), with active petitioning drives just finishing up in Michigan and Connecticut.

Colorado recently passed a new, more liberal ballot access law requiring simply that a third party have 1,000 registered voters by the July 1 prior to an election in order to be on the ballot. Thanks to heroic work by Associate Director of Ballot Access David Shapiro, who personally registered 1100 Colorado voters in only 11 days, the Natural Law Party had 1600 registered voters by July 1 and is now running nine candidates on the ballot.

In Ohio, under the leadership of state chair Zanna Feitler, all the candidates successfully raised funds to hire petitioners and often helped gather signatures themselves. Ms. Feitler, with great help from Billie Eastman and Terry Snider, submitted 8,000 signatures for the Governor’s race--well over the 5,000 required. John Fitch, Carol Ann McCoy, and Dennis Slotnick likewise submitted far more signatures than required for their races. The Secretary of State's office has now officially confirmed these candidacies.

Nevada ballot access law requires Republican and Democratic candidates to register before third party candidates. This provision has allowed the Natural Law Party to enter candidates in races in which only one major party candidate will be running. This strategy should ensure that our candidates will win more than 1% of the statewide vote, which will give the party automatic ballot access in Nevada in the year 2000 election.

Michigan law requires a third party to gather 31,000 valid voter signatures for ballot access, including at least 100 signatures from each of at least 8 congressional districts. The Michigan Natural Law Party ballot access office, established and overseen by David Shapiro and ably managed by Tom Haggarty, set a higher goal of 300 signatures from each of 10 districts. A week before the state deadline, the Party submitted 40,000 signatures--well in excess of the required total. Over 20 prospective candidates are now waiting for confirmation of Party ballot access in order to declare their candidacies. All our heartfelt thanks go to Chris Wege, whose great support has made our successes in Michigan possible.

We send our deepest appreciation to all the hard-working volunteers, candidates, and Party leaders who have helped make these achievements possible. Our goal is to be on the ballot in at least 30 states, so we continue to need both petitioners and your generous financial contributions. Please help in any way you can. Your support will assure success both this year and in the year 2000.