Virginia: Appeals court hears arguments on Va. law barring out-of-state petition circulators

Thu, Mar 21 2013 — Source: The Washington Post

The fate of Virginia’s law prohibiting out-of-state residents from circulating petitions for third-party presidential candidates rests with a federal appeals court, which heard arguments Wednesday on a judge’s decision striking down the statute as an unconstitutional restraint on political speech.

Virginia’s solicitor general, E. Duncan Getchell Jr., told a three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that without the law, it would be too difficult to prosecute nonresident petition circulators who commit election fraud.