New Jersey has not had any ballot-qualified parties other than the Democratic and Republican Parties ever since the definition of “political party” was amended in 1920. There is no other state with a historical record that restrictive. The law requires a group to have polled 10% of all the votes cast for lower house of the state legislature, for its nominees for state legislature. New Jersey is the only state that has ever had a vote test that excludes all the statewide offices. See this story about the court hearing. As the article notes, not all counties in New Jersey use a discriminatory ballot format. State law permits each county to design its own general election ballot.

The article in Press of Atlantic City had more information about the complaint. Judge James Savio ruled that “to order the county clerk to revise the ballot at this point creates extreme confusion among the general election” According to the article:

Stein had claimed that the straight-line party columns were unfair to independent and third-party candidates and pointed to Salem County’s ballot, in which candidates are all listed separately under each office, as a fairer system. Stein also claimed that both the Republican and Democratic parties did not meet the requirement needed to get a column on the ballot, each having not received 10 percent of the vote total of the previous state general election during the primary election.

According to his bio on VoteSmart’s website, a good place for information on candidates, Gary Stein has more foreign policy suggestions in his platform than one might expect. The following is written by Stein:

To catch the attention of the NY Times and point out an obviously good story; me, my friend (back in Mexico), the mismanagement of relations between aforementioned crooked Mexico, the United States and Canada; all subjects which the Times mysteriously doesn’t think I’m qualified to show them…..unless of course they haven’t seen, or opened a few hundred e-mails I’ve sent to the publisher and president on down. My e-mail address as of early October has been “forsaken@steinforgovernor,” which might look more professional then the old “hot mail,” steingovernor2009@hotmail.com

Also, he wrote Ronald Regan as his favorite President:

“He was one of us, he “was mad as hell and not going to take it anymore.” You don’t believe me? Ask the Air Traffic Controller’s Union who their favorite president was.”

Here are a few videos of Gary Stein speaking from the unique homepage of Stein’s candidacy. It’s pretty colorful and I suggest you check it out: