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Libertarians want easier ballot access The Tulsa World Wed., Oct. 24, 2007 By By BARBARA HOBEROCK, World Capitol Bureau http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?articleID=071024_1_A5_spanc53057 OKLAHOMA CITY -- Oklahoma's election laws are too restrictive, meaning voters get too few choices, two prominent Libertarian officials said. Former U.S. Rep. Bob Barr, R-Ga., now a member of the Libertarian National Committee, and William Redpath, chairman of the national committee, were at the state Capitol on Tuesday to promote an initiative petition to reduce the number of signatures required to get third-party candidates on the ballot. They later attended a fund-raiser for Oklahomans for Ballot Access Reform, which is circulating an initiative petition to lower the threshold. "As somebody involved in the political process for a long time, I am certainly in favor of helping folks who want to open up the process and make it a bit easier to give some choices in politics," said Barr, who said he left the Republican Party because it was no longer interested in its constitutional roots and protecting individual freedom and liberty. Redpath said Oklahoma has one of the nation's most restrictive ballot access standards. "Oklahoma is one of five states that does not allow write-in votes for any office," he said. "So the situation in Oklahoma in 2004 was either vote for (George) Bush or (John) Kerry or don't vote for president at all. I think that is the only state where that existed." The petition calls for reducing the number of signatures required to maintain party status from 10 percent of the votes cast in the presidential or gubernatorial election to 2 percent. The effort also seeks to reduce the number of signatures necessary to get on the ballot through petition to 5,000 signatures from about 70,000. Click here to find out how you can join the campaign for FAIR and DEMOCRATIC ballot acccess laws.