Petition effort questioned

Gerard Caron walked into the Auburn Post Office and was met by a woman with a pair of clipboards.

"This petition is against gay marriage and this other petition is to support gay marriage," she said, according to Caron.

The Poland man said he asked her why there would be a petition to support something that already happened, referring to the petition "in support of" gay marriage.

"She just kinda gave me a little grin and didn't say anything," he said.

Then he looked at the two petitions and discovered they were identical, both were supporting the repeal of the same-sex marriage law, Caron said.

Caron said he spoke to a friend who had a similar experience at the Lewiston Post Office.

Julie Flynn, deputy secretary of state, said her office has received calls from people concerned about the petitioning process, but not a surprising number.

"It's a buyer beware situation for the voter; they really need to be sure of what they are signing," she said. "But people can say what they want, it's a First Amendment issue. We don't have anything in law that allows us to monitor or enforce signature gatherers."

Shenna Bellows, executive director of the Maine Civil Liberties Union and a leader of the coalition seeking to maintain the same-sex marriage law, agreed petitioners have a right to free speech.

"They can say anything they want to say. It's just unfortunate that they are suggesting that signing the petition would mean you were a supporter of same-sex marriage when in fact, it's the opposite," she said.

<snip>

http://www.sunjournal.com/story/322726-3/MaineNews/Petition_effort_questioned/

Now there's a surprise.


NOT!

I know how faint I felt after finding out they lie.

ask to see her identification, and track her back to her vehicle. Also, take a petition off the clipboard.

Let's go find these people and expose them, and their organization.

If they want to play dirty, don't bring a mudball to a knife fight.

:hi:

If someone hands you a petition that you don't like, can you rip it up with impunity even if it has the signatures of other people on it? How much trouble can you get in for doing this?

Not that any of them are legal.

1) In most states, if there are "stray markings" on a petition page, all signatures on that page are considered invalid. For example, a large, squiggly line down the middle of the page would be more than sufficient. Many pages can be "accidentally" marked in such a way when someone hands one a clipboard.

2) Grabbing a clipboard and tearing things up can get one physically assaulted. While certainly still illegal, one is less likely to get assaulted if one quietly sneaks away with a stack of petitions. There is also a chance that if one gets away with shoving a stack into their jacket un-noticed, one could have time to collect a larger stack.

This is not legal advice.

This is merely entertaining musing.

When I need to use a laundromat to wash the big stuff, I tidy up the place and throw away the clutter people have left lying around; soda cans, candy wrappers, stacks of religious tracts.

It's even worse because I can't remember the lyrics.

I'm envisioning a stray mark that looks remarkably like a statement that "this petition was misrepresented to me as supporting gay marriage."

But a more realistic imaginary scenario would involve simple swipe marks.

Writing complex statements all over a sheet would take too long for our imaginary perpetrator to mark enough forms.

If they are caught, and enough people complain, then all signatures gathered by that person are supposed to be considered illegal, and they get the axe.

Get names people!

Example - in Ohio, they are trying again for gambling...and one petitioner, who was in a certain city gathering signatures, when asked if a casino was already scheduled for that city, the individual continually answered yes, there is a casino scheduled for xxxxxxxx.

Not true, and the complaint was made by multiple people. Any signatures gathered by this individual have now been declared illegal...did not even have to go to court for that...the gambling side is NOT fighting it, they know you cannot "say anything"

You cannot outright lie to someone when asking them to sign the petition.

GET NAMES PEOPLE!

edit - angry typos

...approach these signature gatherers with a hidden recording device and/or video an catch them red-handed lying about the intent of the petition. Get these SOBs busted and the petitions invalidated.