The New York Times has published a long article about the Green Party. The theme is that the Republican Party in the past and currently has helped in a few states to get the Green Party on the ballot.

The story is myopic. The authors take it for granted that it is difficult for a party like the Green Party to get on the ballot. The authors should ask the big question: why should be difficult for a party with some measure of support to need the support of a more powerful organization to get on the ballot? The Green Party has elected state legislators in three states, and it polled 1,457,217 votes for president in 2016, even though it was not on the ballot in six states.

In Great Britain and Canada, two countries that are very similar to the United States, ballot access is so easy that the Green Party regularly qualifies for the ballot in virtually every district, for Parliament. If it is true that the U.S. Green Party’s presence in the campaign injures the Democratic Party, then it is probably also true that the Green Party’s existence in Canada injures the Liberal Party, and that the Green Party in Great Britain injures the Labour Party. But no one in either Canada or Great Britain ever even imagines having an election law that would keep the Green Party off the ballot.

The Times also ignores the evidence that left parties and candidates in the U.S. do not injure the Democratic Party. The Times makes no mention of Political Science/Pollster Sam Lubell’s findings that the Progressive Party of 1948, which ran former vice-president Henry Wallace for president, helped Harry Truman to defeat Thomas Dewey. The Times makes no mention of the findings of four major pollsters in 2004 that a slight majority of Nader voters said, if Nader were removed from the ballot, they would vote for George W. Bush, not John Kerry. See the Washington Post of October 22, 2004, front page.

The Times also says that 2020 Green Party presidential nominee Howie Hawkins is on the ballot in 28 states. Actually he is on in 29 states, plus the District of Columbia, and also he is on the Guam advisory ballot.