Ballot-access.org notes the encouraging development in an Ohio case, Moore v. Brunner, about residency requirements for petitioners. A Socialist Party candidate named Brian Moore who is seeking to run as an independent candidate in Ohio sought relief against a state law that requires petition circulators to be residents of Ohio and registered to vote in the state.

The Southern District of Ohio, Eastern Division granted preliminary relief against the law.

Although the law has not yet been declared unconstitutional, while that part of the case is pending any adult may circulate an independent-candidate petition in Ohio. Ohio tried to persuade the judge that even if he issued an injunction against the registration requirement, he should still let the state bar out-of-state residents from circulating an independent-candidate petition. But the judge rejected the state’s plea. Although a theoretical in-state residency requirement might be constitutional, the judge said, Ohio has no such law on the books. It only has the law requiring registration for circulators. Thanks to law professor Mark R. Brown, who is doing this case pro bono.

The relevant Ohio statute states:

No person shall be entitled to…circulate any declaration of candidacy or any nominating, or recall petition, unless the person is registered as an elector and will have resided in the county and precinct where the person is registered for at least thirty days at the time of the next election.

The court ruled, in part:

In Buckley, the United States Supreme Court addressed whether a state could prohibit unregistered voters from circulating petitions for ballot initiatives. The Supreme Court concluded that because the requirement that circulators be registered voters (as opposed to voter-eligible individuals) decreased the pool of potential circulators, the requirement imposed an unjustified burden on political expression by limiting both the number of voices that could be heard supporting the initiative at issues and the number of individuals who would consequently hear the message…. The registration requirement therefore failed to pass constitutional muster….

By making political speech more difficult, the Ohio scheme “virtually guarantee[s] that there will be less of it.” Citizens for Tax Reform v. Deters, 518 F.3d 375, 388 (6th Cir. 2008) (addressing circulator compensation regulation). Although Plaintiffs have failed to present much evidence of the impact of the registration requirement, the inherent nature of the requirement speaks in a limited but inescapable way to its effect. Moreover, Defendant [i.e., the state of Ohio] has notably failed to produce evidence of the necessity of the law to achieve a lawful and desirable purpose, such as to prevent voter fraud. Thus, in this near vacuum of evidence, the Court is left with a law that undeniably imposes a burden with scant contemporary evidence of a need for such a law or how it achieves fulfilling whatever worthwhile and permissible need it purportedly exists to fulfill. Plaintiffs are therefore likely to prevail on their attack on the registration requirement.

The residency requirement fares equally unwell….

[T]he Court GRANTS Plaintiffs’ motion for a preliminary injunction…. The Court ORDERS that Defendant is hereby ENJOINED and shall refrain from enforcing or applying, or directing or commanding any other state or local official to enforce or apply, Ohio Rev. Code § 3503.06(A) to Plaintiffs and any other persons who circulate part-petitions on behalf of any candidate for President in the State of Ohio.

The decision, authored by U.S. District Judge Gregory Frost, enjoins applying the law only to those circulating petitions on behalf of presidential candidates. But if the law is eventually ruled unconstitutional, presumably all petition circulators would be spared the onerous requirement.