Opinion ID: 772250
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Ohio election laws pertaining to voting cues

Text: 4 At issue in this appeal are two sections of the Ohio Revised Code that combine to regulate how eligible candidates appear on the general-election ballot. The first describes the ballot format. See Ohio Rev. Code § 3505.03. Voting cues, which are descriptions of political affiliation, are allowed under this section, but only for candidates of political parties that are recognized under Ohio law. Under the name of each candidate nominated at a primary election and each candidate certified by a party committee . . . shall be printed, in less prominent type face than that in which the candidate's name is printed, the name of the political party by which the candidate was nominated or certified. Id. 5 The second relevant section defines a political party under Ohio law. See Ohio Rev. Code § 3517.01. A political party . . . is any group of voters that, at the most recent regular state election, polled for its candidate for governor in the state or nominees for presidential electors at least five per cent of the entire vote cast for that office or that filed with the secretary of state. Id. If, however, a new political party seeks to become qualified, then it must file a petition signed by qualified electors equal in number to at least one per cent of the total vote for governor or nominees for presidential electors at the most recent election, declaring their intention of organizing a political party, the name of which shall be stated in the declaration, and of participating in the succeeding primary election, held in even-numbered years, that occurs more than one hundred twenty days after the date of filing. Id. As a result, a candidate must be the nominee of a qualified party as defined under Ohio Revised Code §3517.01 in order to obtain a partisan cue on the ballot pursuant to Ohio Revised Code § 3505.03. An independent candidate for election to an office, in contrast, must simply file a statement of candidacy and a nominating petition with the requisite number of signatures. See Ohio Rev. Code §3513.257. 6 In sum, all candidates listed on the Ohio ballot must gain access either as the nominee of a qualified political party, through the independent-petition procedure, or as a member of a previously unqualified political party that obtains enough signatures to become a political party as defined in Ohio Revised Code § 3517.01. Both Schrader and the Ohio Attorney General agree that Ohio Revised Code § 3505.03 was properly interpreted to deny Schrader, and other future candidates who, like him, are members of unqualified political parties, a partisan cue on the ballot. 7 Ohio's election laws have been the subject of constitutional scrutiny in several prior cases. One is Williams v. Rhodes, 393 U.S. 23, 32 (1968) (declaring Ohio's ballot-access scheme that required a new party to collect the signatures of 15 percent of the electors in the previous gubernatorial election unconstitutional because it was so restrictive, and because it effectively provided the Democratic and Republican parties with a complete monopoly). Another is Anderson v. Celebrezze, 460 U.S. 780 (1983) (striking down Ohio's early deadline for independent candidates to file a statement of candidacy and a nominating petition as an unconstitutional burden on the voting and associational rights of their supporters). More recently, however, this court has upheld the signature requirement of Ohio's independent-petition procedure under Ohio Revised Code § 3513.257, finding that the burden of obtaining the signatures of one percent of the qualified electors in the last gubernatorial election is not unconstitutionally burdensome. See Miller v. Lorain County Bd. of Elections, 141 F.3d 252 (6th Cir. 1998). 8 The specific sections at issue in Schrader's case, §§3505.03 and 3517.01, were scrutinized by this court in Rosen v. Brown, 970 F.2d 169 (6th Cir. 1992). In particular, the plaintiff in Rosen challenged the failure of § 3505.03 to allow the cue of Independent to be used for candidates who gain access to the ballot through the independent-petition procedure. This court held that §3505.03 was unconstitutional because it violates the First and Fourteenth Amendment rights of Independent candidates to be so designated on Ohio's general election ballots. Rosen, 970 F.2d at 178. 9 Despite this court's ruling in Rosen, the Ohio legislature reenacted § 3505.03 in 1995 without any changes to the portion of the statute that deals with voting cues on the ballot. Schrader is thus challenging the same voting-cue language in Ohio Revised Code § 3505.03 that this court struck down vis-a-vis independent candidates in Rosen. At oral argument, however, counsel for the state noted that Ohio regularly follows Rosen, even though the relevant portion of the statute has not changed. It does so by informally asking candidates who gain access to the ballot through the independent-petition procedure whether they wish to have the cue Independent affiliated with their names on the general-election ballot. 10 Schrader notes that as a result of the connection between §3505.03 and § 3517.01, a previously unqualified party that wishes to place a candidate on the general-election ballot with the party's voting cue must file the requisite number of signatures approximately one year before the general election. This results in an earlier filing deadline for candidates of unqualified political parties than for independent candidates. The discrepancy in the timing of the filing deadlines, however, was not raised as an issue on appeal and is therefore not before us. Schrader obtained access to the ballot under the independent-petition procedure, and his only challenge is to the constitutionality of Ohio's ballot-cue system under §3505.03. 11