The system is set up by parties for parties
But a court in Ohio pokes the system with a stick:
Ohio’s rules for primary elections make it too hard for minor parties to get on the ballot, a federal appeals court ruled.
Parties automatically qualify for the primary ballot if their candidate for governor or president received at least 5 percent of the vote in the previous Ohio election. Any other party must file a petition four months before the primary election with signatures equal to 1 percent of the number of total votes cast in the last state election.
That requirement meant minor parties had to file petitions with 32,290 voter signatures by Nov. 3, 2003, to get candidates on the March 2004 primary ballot.
In a 2-1 opinion, a U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals panel Wednesday that the rules were unnecessarily strict and tougher for small parties to meet. The court ruled Ohio’s rules violate the First Amendment and have “a negative impact … on minor parties and on political activity as a whole in Ohio.”
I’ve noticed here in Tennessee also that minor parties aren’t even identified on the ballot.
