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RALEIGH — Smaller political parties face too many obstacles if they want candidates listed on North Carolina ballots, lawyers for the Libertarian and Green parties told a N.C. Court of Appeals panel Monday.

The justices were hearing the appeal of a 2005 case brought by the Libertarian Party when it lost ballot access after the 2004 election.

Since then, the state has lowered its standards but third parties say it’s still a nearly impossible task to get listed on ballots as Democrats and Republicans routinely do.

A party that is not already officially recognized by the state has to gather signatures equalling 2 percent of those who cast votes in the previous gubernatorial election. That will amount to nearly 80,000 signatures for parties wanting on the ballot in 2012.

Kenneth Soo, a lawyer for the Libertarian Party, said that was a heavy burden for parties just starting out.

Libertarians, he said, spent about $130,000 and three years to get on the ballot in 2008, only barely meeting the state’s requirements.

“It’s a tremendous task, an expensive task,” Soo said.

Soo argued that North Carolina’s ballot access laws violate guarantees of free association and free speech in the state constitution, which he said go further than even the federal First Amendment.

Although Libertarians will keep their ballot access until at least 2012, lawyers in the case argued that other political parties deserved to have the threshold lowered. And it’s possible the Libertarians could one day lose ballot access and again have to petition to exist.

Alexander Peters, a deputy attorney general who defended the state law, said the court should reject the party’s arguments both on procedural grounds and because the state’s access restrictions are reasonable.

And, he added, that the very fact the Libertarians were able to gain access proved the point that getting on the ballot was not impossible for third parties, even if it was costly and time consuming.

“The larger the ballot, the greater the potential for errors and complications,” Peters said, arguing that allowing third parties to proliferate would complicate the administration of elections.

Judge Sanford L. Steelman Jr., one of the three justices hearing the case, asked Peters if that was sufficient grounds to make ballot access more difficult.

“We could solve all of it by just having one party,” Steelman quipped, sparking chuckles from his colleagues.

Peters said that there would probably at least always be two parties.

Although there is no set deadline, it is likely the justices will issue a ruling this summer.

Contact Mark Binker at (919) 832-5549 or mark.binker@news-record.com