Proposed Bill Could Bring Change to Springfield
Written by admin on March 1, 2019
NORMAL—A new senate bill was proposed in late January in an effort to level the playing field in Springfield. Republican State Senator Jason Barickman of Bloomington was added as chief co-sponsor of the bill Thursday.
Senate bill 141, proposed by Democratic State Senator Andy Manar, would reduce the number of signatures that non-major parties, such as libertarians, would need to obtain to make the ballot for election. This could change the game of politics allowing for more competition during elections and more voices to be heard.
Illinois State University American politics professor Kerri Milita offers her expertise on ballot access laws.
“A lot of people think it’s unfair to the electoral process and it denies voters the full range of choices that they would have of selecting people to represent them,” said Milita.
Republicans have proposed legislation similar to this in the past with no success as it challenges the authority of the traditional parties. Although Milita thinks the chances of this bill being approved are fairly low, Chairman of the Libertarian Party of Illinois Bennett Morris is supportive, yet unsure of its standing.
“Currently across the country people are leaving those two old parties, declaring themselves independents, libertarians, greens, constitutionalists, etc. because they know there’s more than just two voices in politics. There’s more than two solutions to every problem,” said Morris.
Morris feels that this bill could be the reform that Illinois government needs.
“Ballot access laws are the biggest problem… I would say that if senate bill 141 gets out of committee and gets a vote then that will be a barometer to tell people which of these democrats and republicans are actually the voice of their constituents and which of them are there exclusively to tow the party line,” said Morris.
The bill was sent to the Senate Subcommittee on election law. More information regarding the progress will come in the weeks to follow.
Grace Barbic contributed to this story
