The ramifications from the Maine Supreme Judicial Court’s exclusion of independent U.S. Senate candidate Herbert Hoffman will be felt far beyond his campaign.

On Monday, justices said Hoffman, a retired psychologist from Ogunquit, let his attention stray just enough to invalidate three nominating petition signatures he swore were signed in his presence. They were gathered by his designees but Hoffman, the sworn circulator, wasn’t “present” when the persons signed.

This miscue cost him his candidacy.

A judge and the secretary of state thought just the three signatures should be stricken, which would still have given Hoffman more than 4,000, the ballot threshold. The high court disagreed, saying the page of names should be voided, which arguably disenfranchises the legitimate signers who supported the Hoffman campaign.

Of course, Hoffman could have avoided this showdown by getting more signatures. His error left him vulnerable to this legal challenge from a formidable opponent: the Democratic Party he shunned.

The court’s seemingly harsh declaration – for the want of one signature, a whole page is disqualified – does follow the letter of Maine law. Justices said they were bound by the Legislature’s choice of language: petitions that fail to meet statutory requirements are void, no questions asked.

In turn, Hoffman was bound by a strict interpretation of ballot access. And future political efforts will be bound by this establishment – in legal precedent – of such exacting standards for signature-gathering.

The onus is now upon campaigns to ensure every signature is observed and validated, or they risk losing entire petitions. This goes for candidates, people’s vetoes and citizen initiatives; each follow the same basic signing rules.

The ability to disqualify whole pages by discrediting one signature has political value. Maine often has contentious citizen-initiated referenda; this year’s is about increased alcohol, soda and insurance claim taxes to fund DirigoHealth.

And there are loud allegations – voiced by health insurance advocates – of improprieties in signature-gathering by the anti-tax campaign, including accusations that circulators circulated mistruths to cajole citizens into signing the petition. The stakes in this referendum are high.

The court has now set the threshold for ballot access even higher.

Accountability of petitioners is crucial for preserving the democratic process; the court is right to demand compliance from political aspirants. But ballot access standards shouldn’t be set so high as to become exclusionary.

This is a danger from the court’s tight interpretation.