(Glen checks back in with a report from the committee hearing. - promoted by Karl-Thomas Musselman)
COMMITTEE HEARING:
Well, I sat up till 10 pm to try to hear the rational for this bill. Leo Berman didn't give ANY. He just laid it out and told that it instituted a closed primary.
The only verbal testimoy for the bill was by a former national RNC member who now runs the Texas Home School Coalition.
Green Party and Libertarian Party oppose unless we use the registration as the basis for them to get ballot access instead of having to petition.
AFL-CIO and League of Women Voters sign in against.
No position by the Texas Democratic Party or the Texas Republican Party.
In other words, there was no real discussion.
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Back in the old days (when most of the writers of BOR weren't yet born), one of the reforms dreamed about by progressive Democrats was voter registration by party affiliation. Additionally, once you declare your affiliation as a Democrat or Republican, that's the only primary or convention in which you could participate.
So now its 2007 and Rep. Leo Berman, chair of the House Elections Committee, and a very partisan Republican has filed HB 3118. It's scheduled for hearing on Wednesday in his committee.
It requires party affiliation for the 2008 primaries.
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