Richard Winger, San Francisco, Calif.

In response to Ross Hausfeld’s good column about the North Dakota legislature, North Dakota is the only state that bans minor party candidates for the legislature from appearing on the November ballot. In every other state, minor party candidates for the legislature have appeared on the general election ballot at some time during the last six years.

North Dakota requires that if a minor party wants to place a legislative candidate on the general election ballot, approximately 12% to 15% of all the primary voters must choose the minor party’s primary ballot and vote for any legislative nominees appearing on that primary ballot. This is so difficult in practice, no minor party legislative candidate has appeared on the general election ballot in North Dakota since 1976, when the American Party managed to do it.

North Dakota is the only state that still has a minimum participation law in place for minor party primaries. Similar laws were struck down in 2004 in both Minnesota and Washington. I publish Ballot Access News.