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State News Release |
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| NY Green Party Wins Voter Enrollment Lawsuit. |
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Green Party of New York State For Immediate Release: June 4, 2003 Green Party Winners to hold Inauguration in New Paltz on Sat. June 7th; Greens Set to Petition for Candidates and Party officials. The federal district court in Brooklyn (Judge John Gleeson) gave the Green Party a resounding victory late Friday afternoon, ruling that New Yorkers will continue to have the right to enroll as Green Party voters, and further that the Green Party will continue to be listed on the voter registration forms. The preliminary injunction requires the State Board of Elections to continue to maintain green party voter registration information at least until the 2006 Gubernatorial election. "This is a great victory for democracy, for the more than 30,000 New Yorkers who have already enrolled as Greens, and for the millions who continue to oppose the bipartisan war at home and abroad. Judge Gleeson has spoke out strongly in favor of the constitutional right for voters to join together in a political party. It is important to preserve the right of the Green Party to provide an alternative to voters who are committed to peace and nonviolence, to grassroots democracy, justice and ecology. We welcome those who agree with our principles to join us by using their right to enroll as Greens," said Mark Dunlea, Chairperson of the Green Party of NYS. Petitioning for a seat on the state committee of the Green Party began on June 3rd. In ruling in favor of the Green Party, the judge turned the Temporary Restraining Order into a Preliminary Injunction, noting the significant progress the Green Party has made in enrolling voters and running candidates since it became an official party, including the party's recent electoral successes in the village of New Paltz. The inauguration of the Green Mayor Jason West and two Village Trustees will take place Saturday, June 7, 2003 in the Peace Park at 3:00 P.M. The Green Party is not challenging the lawsuit that it lost ballot status when it failed to get 50,000 votes for recent gubernatorial candidate Stanley Aronowitz, even though the Green Party's candidate for Attorney General polled more than 50,000 votes in the same election, and Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader polled more than 260,000 votes in New York in the last Presidential election. The Green Party however will continue to have the right to run candidates on the Green Party line using the petitioning process for independents. The Greens will be fielding scores of candidates for local office throughout the state this year. Ballot status makes it easier for a party to field candidates for office, including the right to put candidates on the ballot for statewide office without the need for petitioning. Under current New York State election law, the only way for a political party to get or maintain "ballot status" is to receive 50,000 votes for Governor. However, as the Judge noted in his decision, New York's limit of only one way to qualify a political party every four years is unusual. At a minimum, the other states allow a political party to qualify itself as an "official, ballot status" party during the Presidential election either by petition or vote results. The Green Party said that it would easily be able to collect the needed signatures for President to put Green Party candidates on the ballot for next year's Presidential and U.S. Senate election, but that this would not restore the party's right to be a ballot qualified party in New York. The Greens are asking the State Legislature to pass legislation providing such a mechanism for the 2004 Presidential election. State party leaders have authorized legal action if needed. The loss of ballot status allows the Green Party the flexibility to modify its own internal rules if it does not agree with New York State election rules governing parties with ballot status. However the Green Party has said that it will to continue to follow state election law for political parties as much as possible in managing their internal affairs. "We trust that we will win back all of our rights as a political party in New York within the next few years. This court ruling was a critical step in this effort," added Betty Wood, Secretary of the State Party. The Green Party recently changed its party rules to codify how enrolled Greens can run for state committee seats now that they are not covered by state election law, voting to follow existing state and party rules. The party had already successfully asserted its right two years ago to run state committee elections during odd election years to fill any vacancies in the two year terms, rather than having to wait to the regular elections in even number years. At its recent state committee meeting in Rensselaer, the party voted to allow enrollees to use the petition period of both ballot qualified parties and independents, so that signatures from 5% of the Green enrollees in the State Committee district can be collected from June 3 to August 19. The Party Secretary will perform the role of the Board of Elections in terms of receiving and reviewing petitions. In addition, all Green Party elections are supposed to be conducted by preferential voting, where candidates are ranked in order of preference by the voters. If no candidate receives a majority of the first round, then the lowest rank candidate is removed and the second ranked choices of their supporters are counted. This continues until one candidate gets a majority. The State Board of Election has refused to implement this for the 2000 Senate Election, where former Gubernatorial candidate Al Lewis ran in a primary against Mark Dunau and Ronnie Dugger. Using plurality voting under existing state election law, Dunau won a close primary election. In 2004, the Party will be able to use preferential voting to determine the winner of any Senate primary. State Senator Liz Krueger, who ran on the Green Party line as well as the Democrat and others, has introduced legislation at the party's request to implement IRV voting for statewide races and the NYC citywide primaries, as well as in other elections at local discretion. Similar bills have been introduced in the state Assembly this year by Assemblyman Fred Thiele and others. A copy of the court decision can be found at
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