Break out Asmodeus’s snowboard, because I find myself in agreement with Antonin Scalia. The express purpose of I-872 was to destroy the parties’ ability to nominate candidates, and the majority opinion (written by Clarence Thomas) failed to find this unconstitutional. It remains, however, violently anti-partisan, and will result in elections becoming even more expensive (for those interested in reducing the "demand side" of campaign financing). It doesn’t even permit the parties to take my preferred option: nominating candidates via conventions. If the state chooses to hold a primary for a given partisan office, failure to participate in the "top two" primary prevents a candidate from running in the general (bye bye, third parties).
As an inertial Democrat in a massively Democratic county and a frequently Democratic state, I suppose I ought to find the prospect of restricting general election voters to two Democrats attractive. But if anyone can call themselves a Democrat without consequence, then the parties’ identities will lose whatever meaning they have left, and DINOs will become the rule instead of the exception.
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