The Independent View: Lawsuit Seeks to Close Montana's Open Primaries

Thanks to Ballot Access News for this post.

Attorney Matthew Monforton of Bozeman filed a federal lawsuit Monday, in District Court on behalf of the Ravalli County Republican Central Committee to close the state's open primaries. It names Montana Secretary of State Linda McCulloch and Ravalli County's election administrator as defendants.

Monforton is a State House candidate who successfully pushed the state Republican Party this spring to add support of closed primaries to its platform. Monforton said he filed the lawsuit with the 2016 elections in mind. He said he expects other county political committees to join it.

Montana has never had a closed primary, but Monforton's suit will test the constitutional grounds.

"This involves the party's First Amendment right to choose its own leaders and choose its own nominees," said Monforton. "So that's what gives the Federal Court jurisdiction."

What may have been a key springboard for this suit was a State Senate race between Scott Boulanger and Pat Connell. Connell won that race by a slim margin. Some Democrats said they voted for Connell because they thought he was a more moderate Republican. Many Democrats said they don't have a voice in Ravalli County because of a GOP majority.

The president of the Montana State Democratic Women's Alliance said the primary is the only place some Democrats get a chance to vote for people who will represent their interests. Corrine Gantt called the wing of the Republican Party that supports the suit "sore losers." "They should be representing the entire county or the entire district," said Gantt, "not just the narrow slice of ideology."

The state will probably defend the open primary by saying a county party doesn’t have standing to sue, and that only the state party has standing. That has been an issue in the South Carolina lawsuit on the same subject, in which only the Greenville County Republican Party sued, not the state party, and did not have standing.