Opinion ID: 4283041
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: LaRouche v. Kezer

Text: In LaRouche, two candidates for the Democratic nomination for president challenged their inability to qualify for the Connecticut primary election ballot. LaRouche, 990 F.2d at 37. At issue were two Connecticut ballot-access laws. The first, the “media recognition” statute, required the Secretary of State to place on the primary ballot those candidates who are “generally and seriously recognized 31 according to reports in the national or state news media.” Id. (quoting Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9–465(a) (1989)). The second, the “petition alternative” statute, enabled candidates failing to gain access under the media recognition statute to appear on the ballot “if, within the next fourteen days, they collect signatures from one percent of their party’s registered voters.” Id. (citing Conn. Gen. Stat § 9–465(b), 9–467 to 469 (1989)). The district court in that case examined the two statutes in isolation, ultimately upholding the petition alternative but ruling that the media recognition statute was void for vagueness. LaRouche v. Kezer, 787 F. Supp. 298, 304–05 (D. Conn. 1992). On appeal, the Second Circuit held that the district court had erred in analyzing each statute separately. Rather, the court held, the constitutionality of a state’s ballot access provisions should be examined in light of the entirety of the state’s comprehensive election code. LaRouche, 990 F.2d at 39 (citing Burdick v. Takushi, 304 U.S. 428, 438–39 (1992); Storer, 415 U.S. at 738–40 (1974); Am. Party of Tex., 415 U.S. at 786–87). From this perspective, the court concluded that: if the petition alternative would be constitutional standing alone, the additional method of a media recognition test is not in any sense an unconstitutional burden. To the contrary, because it is not constitutionally required, the media recognition test, whether or not vague, increases the opportunities to get on the ballot and reduces the burdens on candidates. . . . In short, if the district court was correct about the constitutionality of the petition alternative standing alone, then the media recognition statute is a fortiori valid as an additional means of ballot access. LaRouche, 990 F.2d at 38–39. The court did add, however, that this approach would not save a ballot qualification statute if the statute were “wholly irrational—a coin32 flip test, for example[.]” Id. at 38 n.1. The lesson from LaRouche, then, is that, provided it is not wholly irrational, an otherwise unconstitutional ballot-access statute will not be struck down so long as there is an alternative, constitutional, method of accessing the ballot. We do not in this case need to adopt this as a per se rule. We do, however, agree with the LaRouche court’s recognition of Supreme Court precedent—not to mention our own precedent—as requiring us to analyze ballot-access opportunities in sum rather than in isolation. See, e.g., Burdick, 504 U.S. at 438–39 (finding a ban on write-in voting to be a limited burden “in light of the adequate ballot access afforded under Hawaii’s election code.”); Artunoff, 687 F.2d at 1379 (holding that the constitutionality of state ballot access laws should be determined only after “due consideration is given to the practical effect of the election laws of a given state, viewed in their totality”) (citing Clements v. Fashing, 457 U.S. 957 (1982)). The lesson we take from LaRouche, then, is that when conducting Anderson-Burdick balancing with regards to state ballot-access laws, due weight should be accorded to whether a challenged provision stands in isolation as the sole method for accessing the ballot, or whether candidates have alternative and constitutionally sufficient paths through which to qualify. In the latter circumstance, the burden that any one particular route to ballot access that the law places on candidates, voters, and parties is necessarily reduced.