Potter Stewart

“ Anyone who wishes, and who is otherwise eligible, may be an independent candidate for any office in Georgia. Any political organization, however new or however small, is free to endorse any otherwise eligible person as its candidate for whatever elective public office it chooses. So far as the Georgia election laws are concerned independent candidates and members of small or newly formed political organizations are wholly free to associate, to proselytize, to speak, to write, and to organize campaigns for any school of thought they wish. ”

“ Moreover, he must succeed in gathering them long before the general election, since a nominating petition must be filed with the Secretary of State in February. That is not all: having compiled those signatures, the candidate must further show that he has received the nomination of a group which qualifies as a 'political party' within the meaning of Ohio law. It is not enough to be an independent candidate for President with wide popular support; one must trace his support to a political party. ”

“ Or they may seek, over a six months' period, the signatures of 5% of the eligible electorate for the office in question. If they choose the latter course, the way is open. For Georgia imposes no suffocating restrictions whatever upon the free circulation of nominating petitions. A voter may sign a petition even though he has signed others, [15] and a voter who has signed the petition of a nonparty candidate is free thereafter to participate in a party primary. [16] The signer of a petition is not required to state that he intends to vote for that candidate at the election. ”

“ It has done so initially by abolishing write-in votes so as to restrict candidacy to names on the ballot; it has eliminated all independent candidates through a requirement that nominees enjoy the endorsement of a political party; it has defined 'political party' in such a way as to exclude virtually all but the two major parties.
'A candidate who seeks a place on the Ohio presidential ballot must first compile signatures of qualified voters who total at least 15% of those voting in the last gubernatorial election. In this election year, 1968, a candidate would need 433,100 such signatures. ”

“ We can find in this system nothing that abridges the rights of free speech and association secured by the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
The appellants' claim under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment fares no better. ”

“ In the Williams case the Court was confronted with a state electoral structure that favored 'two particular parties-the Republicans and the Democrats-and in effect tend (ed) to give them a complete monopoly.' Id., at 32, 89 S.Ct., at 11. ”