By Eric Garris The Alabama Secretary of State recently revised his regulations for petitions for independent candidates and newly-qualifying parties in special elections. The new regulations say that the petitions need not list the date of the special election. This change makes it possible for these petitions to start to circulate as soon as the news gets out that a vacancy has been created. Under the old regulation, special election petitions couldn’t begin to circulate until the Governor had set the date of the special election. …read more