Ridenbaugh Press/Northwest

Richard Devlin

It was supposed to be dead. Although a lot of the individual members of the Oregon Legislature were on board, a measure enabling easier and more widespread activities by minor political parties, including explicitly approved cross-nomination, seemed dead in the water. (The Oregon Education Association was apparently one of the key reasons for that.)

Just now, however, Senate Bill 326 passed the Senate – concurring with House amendments – and from a minor-party point of view, it’s a big deal. A quick rundown from the Oregon Independent Party (via a release):

SB 326 consists of two parts:

1) It repeals HB 2614 (2005), a law that made it much more difficult for non-affiliated candidates to obtain sufficient signatures to be nominated for public office.

2) It now includes the provisions of what used to be HB 2414 (prior to its recent gutting), which allows a candidate who is nominated by more than one party to list up to 3 such party names on the ballot next to her name. More information on HB 2414 is available at http://indparty.com/node/174.

Despite strong bi-partisan support, the passage of the provisions contained in this bill have been in doubt for much of the latter part of the legislative session. For details see: http://wweek.com/editorial/3531/12669/

SB 326 (including the terms of HB 2414) passed last week in the Oregon House on a vote of 42-17. The provisions of this bill are among the top legislative priorities of the Independent Party of Oregon.

Senator Richard Devlin, D-Tualatin, said the finished bill had flaws, but he would push for correction in those in next year’s session (since this year’s is fast approaching completion). The few senators who voted against (all Democrats) said they did so out of concern for the flaws, but all said they’d be at work on those. Meantime, the small partiers should have an existing law on books – not a bad place from which to defend unflawed provisions.

Many are the paths to passage.