Massachusetts Statutes

Section 28. The clerk of cities and towns shall inspect all statements and reports of candidates, or nonelected political committees supporting such candidates, filed with them, within thirty days of the reporting dates required by this chapter, and all other statements and repor…

Section 29. Upon failure to file a statement, report or affidavit within 10 days after receiving notice under section 28, the city or town clerk, as the case may be, shall notify the director thereof and shall furnish him with copies of all papers related thereto and the director…

Section 3. The state chairman of each of the two leading political parties, the state secretary, and a dean of a law school located in the commonwealth, to be appointed by the governor as provided hereinafter, shall serve as a commission for the purposes of selecting the director…

Section 30. The supreme judicial or superior court may compel any person failing to file a statement as above required, or filing a statement not conforming to the foregoing requirements in respect to its truth, sufficiently in detail, or otherwise, to file a sufficient statement…

Section 31. No person compelled to testify in any proceedings under section thirty shall be liable to criminal prosecution for any matters or causes in respect of which he shall be examined or to which his testimony shall relate, except to prosecution for perjury committed in suc…

Section 32. A candidate shall be deemed to have committed a corrupt practice who commits any of the following offences: Making or permitting any person or non-elected political committee authorized by him to make a false return in any statement filed under sections eighteen, nine…

Section 33. (a) If the attorney general or five or more voters have reasonable cause to believe that a corrupt practice, as defined in section thirty-two, has been committed by any successful candidate, other than a candidate for the United States Congress, or for the general cou…

Section 34. Sections one to thirty-three, inclusive, shall apply to all public elections and to elections by the general court and by city councils and by either branch thereof, and, so far as applicable, to the nomination by primaries, caucuses, conventions and nomination papers…

Section 35. Upon a complaint subscribed and sworn to by any person before a district court, alleging that reasonable grounds exist for believing that any law relating to the qualification or registration of voters, or to voting lists or ballots, or to primaries, caucuses, convent…

Section 36. The court may exclude all persons whose presence is not necessary at such inquest; and may also direct the witnesses to be kept so separated that they cannot converse with each other until they have been examined. The attorney general, the district attorney, or some p…

Section 37. Such court or attorney may issue subpoenas for witnesses, who shall be allowed the same fees, whose attendance may be enforced in the same manner, and who shall be subject to the same penalties, as if served with a subpoena in behalf of the commonwealth in a criminal …

Section 38. Such court may employ a stenographer and may have the proceedings reduced to writing; and, if he finds that the law has been violated, shall report to the superior court all the material facts and the names of any persons guilty of any such violation.

Section 39. The court may bind over, as in criminal prosecutions, such witnesses as are necessary, or as said attorney may designate, to appear and testify in the superior court.

Section 40. If a person charged by the report with the commission of an offence is not in custody, the court shall forthwith issue a process for his apprehension; but such process may issue before the filing of said report, if otherwise lawful.

Section 41. No person shall be excused from testifying or producing any papers in any inquest proceedings under sections thirty-five to forty, inclusive, on the ground that his testimony may tend to criminate him or subject him to a penalty or forfeiture, but he shall not be pros…

Section 42. The director in proceedings based upon an election petition, as provided in section thirty-three, and the clerk of the court wherein a person is convicted of a violation of any provision of law relating to corrupt practices in elections, shall, within ten days after f…

Section 5. Each political committee shall organize by filing with the director or, if organized for the purpose of a city or town election only, with the city or town clerk, a statement of organization. The statement of organization shall include: (1) the full name of the politic…

Section 5A. No candidate or individual holding elective public office shall establish, finance, maintain, control or serve as a principal officer of a political action committee; provided, however, that each of the following may authorize one such political committee to which thi…

Section 5B. (a) Every political committee, other than a political party committee or a candidate's committee, shall name and identify itself in its organizational statement pursuant to section five by using a name or phrase that: (i) clearly identifies the economic or other speci…

Section 5C. The office of campaign and political finance shall prepare and update from time to time an online training program to provide information on the requirements of this chapter applicable to treasurers of political committees that file reports with the office. A treasure…

Section 6. A political committee organized or operating on behalf of a candidate for the office of governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, state secretary, treasurer and receiver general or state auditor may receive, pay and expend money or other things of value for reas…

Section 6A. A candidate and such candidate's committee shall not accept any contribution from a political action committee if such contribution would result in such candidate and such committee together receiving from all political action committees aggregate contributions in any…

Section 6B. A ballot question committee may receive, pay and expend money or other things of value solely for the purpose of favoring or opposing the adoption or rejection of a specific question or questions submitted to the voters. A ballot question committee shall not contribut…

Section 7. No person or combination of persons, including a corporation formed under the provisions of chapter one hundred and eighty, shall in connection with any nomination or election receive money or its equivalent, expend or disburse or promise to expend or disburse the same…

Section 7A. (a)(1) An individual may make campaign contributions to candidates or candidates' committees. The aggregate of all such contributions for the benefit of any 1 candidate and that candidate's committee shall not exceed the sum of $1,000 in a calendar year; provided, how…

Section 8. No corporation carrying on the business of a bank, trust, surety indemnity, safe deposit, insurance, railroad, street railway, telegraph, telephone, gas, electric light, heat, power, canal, aqueduct, or water company, no company having the right to take land by eminent…

Section 8A. (1) As used in this section the following words shall have the following meanings:— ''Media organization'', any corporation, partnership or trust which owns or controls a television station, including without limitation cable television, a radio station or any other s…

Section 9. No individual, candidate or political committee, or person acting on behalf of the individual, candidate or political committee, shall accept a contribution of money from any 1 person or political committee if the aggregate amount contributed in a calendar year exceeds…

Section 9A. A political action committee may accept contributions of money from individual contributors by direct deposit of funds into the committee's bank account by wire transfer or other electronic means; provided, however, that said contributor provides the political action …

Section 9B. (a) Any joint contribution received by a candidate or political committee that does not indicate the amount to be attributed to each contributor may be attributed equally to each contributor; provided, however, that the attribution does not cause a contributor to make…

Section 1. There shall be a state ballot law commission consisting of five persons to be appointed by the governor, one of whom shall be a retired justice of the supreme judicial court, appeals court, superior court or district courts of the commonwealth who shall be chairman. Th…

Section 10. The commission shall render a decision on any matter referred to it, pertaining to certificates of nomination or nomination papers for any presidential or biennial state primaries or any biennial state election or to withdrawals of nomination therefore, not later than…

Section 11. If objection is filed under section five or section seven by a person duly nominated for any state, city or town office alleging that an apparent nomination for the same office is a fictitious or nonexisting person or that the name under which a person has been appare…

Section 12. The commission shall be required to keep records of all decisions and an official transcript of all proceedings of the hearings. These documents shall be stored in the office of the state secretary. The commission shall upon written request provide any person appealin…

Section 2. No member of said commission shall hold any public office except that of justice of the peace, notary public, or be a candidate for public office, or member or employee of any political committee. If any member of the commission shall be nominated as a candidate for pu…

Section 3. The members of the commission shall each be paid such compensation for their services not exceeding five thousand dollars annually, as the governor may determine, and shall be reimbursed for expenses necessarily incurred in the performance of their duties. The chairman…

Section 4. The commission may investigate upon objection made in accordance with the provisions of this chapter the legality, validity, completeness and accuracy of all nomination papers and actions required by law to give candidates access to a state ballot or to place an initia…

Section 5. Objections to certificates of nomination and nomination papers for candidates at a presidential primary, state primary, or state election shall be filed with the state secretary within seventy-two hours succeeding five o'clock post meridian of the last day fixed for fi…

Section 6. This section applies only to candidates for president who file nomination papers to be placed on the ballot at presidential primaries, and to all candidates at regular state primaries and biennial state elections. Any candidate who has filed nomination papers with the …

Section 7. Objections to certificates of nomination, nomination papers, or withdrawals for city offices, or to petitions for local ballot questions shall be filed with the city clerk within two working days of the last day fixed for filing such nomination papers, withdrawals, or …

Section 8. The commission with respect to objections to certificates of nominations or nomination papers except those for a special primary or election shall by five o'clock post meridian of the Wednesday following the last day for filing such objections notify all parties involv…

Section 9. Hearings on objections to certificates of nomination or nomination papers, except for special primaries and elections, shall not be held prior to the second Monday following the Friday for filing such objections. Hearings on objections to signatures on initiative or re…

Section 1. Unless a contrary intention clearly appears, the words and phrases used in this chapter shall have the following meanings: ''Director'', the director of campaign and political finance as established by chapter 55. ''Candidate'', any candidate as defined by chapter 55. …

Section 10. No candidate shall be required to accept public financing nor shall any candidate otherwise eligible for public financing be denied such financing solely because an opposing candidate declines to accept such financing.

Section 11. The director shall promulgate such rules and regulations as are necessary to effectuate the purposes of this chapter. The director shall have the same power and authority to investigate the legality, validity, completeness and accuracy of all reports and actions requi…

Section 12. Violation by any person of any provision of this chapter shall, in addition to any civil liabilities established by this chapter, be punished by imprisonment for not more than 1 year or by a fine of not more than on $1,000, or both.