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The state Libertarian Party chair has praised the recent Montana Supreme Court decision to block a referendum changing the states primary election system from appearing on the November ballot.

Libertarian Chair Mike Fellows said Republicans placed Legislative Referendum 27 on the ballot as an effort to eliminate Libertarians from the general election ballot.

Montana voters want their views heard in the general election, and LR-127 would limit those views, Fellows said. Libertarians support the free market of ideas in politics, but the Montana Republican Party wanted to control the free market through LR-127 to achieve its goals.

He said it amounted to eliminating part of the competition from the general election.

We know that most voters start looking at candidates and issues in the general election rather than the primary, Fellow said.

The referendum would have set up a new primary election system under which the names of all candidates from all political parties Democratic, Republican, Libertarian and others for each office would appear on the same primary election ballot. The top two vote-getters for each office, regardless of political party, would compete in the general election.

Under present law, the Democratic and Republican parties have separate primary elections in June. The winners of Democratic and Republican primaries for each office face off in the November general election. Third-party candidates such as Libertarians also appear on the November ballot.

In striking the referendum from the ballot, the court majority found that the title of the referendum exceeded the 100-word limit in the law and that the title was complicated and confusing.

If Republicans had won the governors race in 2012 as well as controlled the Legislature, Fellows said the bill that became the referendum instead would have been signed into law, bypassing voters, he said.

In the 2015 Montana legislative session, you can bet this issue will come up again, Fellows said.

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Libertarian Party pleased referendum blocked