[EL] Scope of Anderson-Burdick "balancing test"

[Michael L. Tellerico]

Good afternoon all,

I am a 3L at the University of Connecticut School of Law and am presently
working on an article examining whether a political party has a
constitutional right to its name/identity.

For some background:  Connecticut has an Independent Party (and other
parties with derivatives of the word "independent" such as "The
Independence Party" or "The Independent Voice Party," etc.).  The General
Assembly raised a concept last year that would have prohibited the word
"independent" from use in the names of political parties.  The rationale
was that people often confuse the term with "unaffiliated" -- that is, some
may colloquially speak of "independent" voters when what they actually mean
is "unaffiliated" voters.  It seems a fair concern that some might conflate
these terms -- CT does primarily operate in a two-party system, and one
might truly consider herself to be "independent" if she is neither
Republican nor Democrat.  However, in CT, the term "Independent" does have
a very particular meaning as it appears on an election ballot.  Underlying
this is the fact that in recent elections, the Independent Party has been
cross-endorsing Republicans (while the Working Families Party has been
cross-endorsing Democrats).  So the effort, on behalf of a
Democratic-controlled legislature, appeared to have partisan motivations,
though the argument was made that it was designed to minimize voter
confusion.

My research brought me to the *Anderson-Burdick* "balancing" test, but I'm
having a difficult time truly pinning down whether this framework applies
*generally* for election regulations, or *specifically* for ballot access
cases.  My research appears to indicate the latter, though I'll admit to
not being as learned in this area as others.

My questions:
a.)  what is the scope of the test laid out in *Anderson *and re-affirmed
in *Burdick*?
b.)  accordingly, what impact does this have on a political party's right
to refer to itself by a particular name?

Any guidance would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks for the opportunity to
discuss/try your minds.
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