A place on the ballot

BOB BARR, a former Republican congressman from Georgia, has performed better in national polls than any Libertarian Party presidential candidate in history. In July, he reached 6 percent nationally in a survey conducted by Zogby International. More recent polls have found him in the 2 to 3 percent range, which may not make for a landslide but is comparable to Ralph Nader's decisive 2000 showing.

In Massachusetts, polls have showed Barr winning as much as 5 percent of the vote - 2 points more than Libertarians need to regain automatic ballot access - and Channel 7/Suffolk University pegged his support at 1 percent earlier this month. But the Commonwealth's voters may not get the opportunity to choose Barr in November, although they were able to vote for lesser known Libertarian candidates like Andre Marrou, Harry Browne, and Michael Badnarik before him. Contemporary Internet sensation and Republican Representative Ron Paul of Texas also made it onto the Massachusetts ballot as a Libertarian in 1988.

Yet the secretary of state's office insists that Barr should be, well, barred. The Massachusetts Libertarian Party listed its state chairman, George Phillies, as a stand-in presidential candidate before the Libertarian National Convention in May. Phillies was seeking the national party's nomination, but told state election officials he wanted the actual nominee to be listed on the ballot if he lost.

Phillies was in fifth place, but after six ballots Barr won. Massachusetts election officials nevertheless refused to put him on the ballot, saying in effect that their policy is like that of a strict restaurant - no substitutions. But the precedents are on the Libertarians' side.

According to Richard Winger of Ballot Access News, Massachusetts allowed vice-presidential substitution for John Anderson in 1980 and was willing to offer it to Pat Buchanan in 2000 and Ralph Nader in 2004. In 1996, the Commonwealth reportedly told the Constitution Party that presidential substitution was also allowed. Bay State Libertarians have claimed that they were initially told the same thing during this election cycle, only to have state election officials reverse themselves in June - after the national convention was over and less than two months before the petitioning window was to close.

The American Civil Liberties Union filed suit last week to help get Barr a place on the ballot. Unfortunately, the intransigence of state election officials has been compounded by mixed messaging by some supporters of the ACLU lawsuit - especially Phillies himself.

Almost immediately after Barr secured the nomination, Phillies told Reason magazine that the Massachusetts Libertarians might hold a state convention to nominate a separate candidate. "Nominating this man," he is quoted as saying of Barr, "is the equivalent of nominating an Imperial Wizard of the KKK to lead a party of African-Americans." He repeated a variation of this statement on the state party's website shortly afterward.

Phillies recently told a newspaper that Barr is a "right-wing Republican," saying that although he would keep his word and support the ACLU's drive to replace him with the Georgian on the ballot, "I think most of the state members of the party will not be heartbroken if this suit is not settled until after Nov. 4."

While Phillies is certainly entitled to object to Barr's policy positions, especially as they relate to the religious and cultural concerns of his state committee members, Massachusetts Libertarians need ex-Republicans like Barr. When the GOP's statewide candidates have been weak or nonexistent it has benefited Libertarian Party candidates.

Republican-leaning voters helped Carla Howell win nearly 6 percent in her race for state auditor in 1998 and 12 percent in her campaign for US Senate in 2000. In the second race, Howell finished just a point behind GOP candidate Jack E. Robinson and received four-fifths as many votes as the Libertarian presidential nominee did nationwide. In 2002, Republicans failed to field a challenger for Senator John Kerry, and Libertarian Michael Cloud received 19 percent of the vote.

Barr is another candidate who could win over disgruntled Republicans and improve Libertarian vote totals. His party has earned a place for its official nominee on the ballot. And even third-party voters and right-wing Republicans deserve a candidate of their choice.

W. James Antle III is associate editor of The American Spectator magazine.