Republican Party Chairman in Providence, Dave Talan, left, hands over petitions with signatures for Mitt Romney to Laurence K. Flynn, executive secretary at the Providence Board of Canvassers and Registration at City Hall yesterday.

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The Providence Journal / Ruben W. Perez

PROVIDENCE — Republicans Mitt Romney, John McCain, Mike Huckabee and Ron Paul and Democrat Christopher Dodd have submitted enough signatures to appear on Rhode Island’s March 4 presidential primary ballots, according to local boards of canvassers.

They join Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton and Republican Rudy Giuliani, who had already amassed more than the required 1,000 validated signatures, the secretary of state’s office reported yesterday. The final step before appearing on the ballot requires the secretary of state to certify the signatures.

Other candidates might appear on the primary ballot. While the deadline for signatures was 4 p.m. yesterday, local boards have until Jan. 10 to validate signatures, and an unknown number of signatures have been submitted without being validated yet, said Chris Barnett, spokesman for Secretary of State A. Ralph Mollis.

“This tells us who is in,” Barnett said. “But it doesn’t tell us who is out. It does give people an idea of who is close.”

Democrat John Edwards was within striking distance with 942 validated signatures, while Democrat Dennis J. Kucinich had 759, Republican Fred Thompson had 724, Republican Duncan Hunter had 477, Republican Hugh Cort had 475, Republican Alan Keyes had 460, Republican Tom Tancredo had 392, Democrat Joseph Biden had 238 and Democrat Bill Richardson had 116. Tancredo recently announced his withdrawal from the race.

Democrats Mike Gravel and Raymond Stebbins had no validated signatures.

Barnett explained that local boards of canvassers validate signatures by checking to see if they are the names of eligible voters in their communities.

Clinton was leading the way with 2,167 validated signatures, while Obama had 1,952, Giuliani had 1,312, Romney had 1,257, Paul had 1233, McCain had 1,224, Huckabee had 1,165 and Dodd had 1,058.

Barnett said even candidates with no validated signatures could end up on the ballot. “It doesn’t mean that at 3:59 p.m. [yesterday] they didn’t submit enough signatures,” he said. “We won’t know until as late as Jan. 10.”

Barnett said the final step is for the secretary of state’s office to certify signatures by checking them against a statewide database of eligible voters.

So far, only Obama has more than the required 1,000 certified signatures. The totals for certified signatures include 1,111 for Obama, 675 for Clinton, 277 for Dodd, 275 for Romney and 273 for Huckabee, according to the secretary of state’s office.

Maureen F. Moakley, a political science professor at the University of Rhode Island, said, “I think what we are seeing with Obama is a lot of energetic young people are willing to step up and support him. And Hillary has always had a strong presence here.”

Moakley said it’s no surprise that Romney and Dodd will be on the ballot because Romney was the governor of neighboring Massachusetts and Dodd is a senator from neighboring Connecticut. And she said she expects Edwards to make the ballot.

Moakley said she was somewhat surprised by Biden’s showing, but she said second-tier candidates might not be focusing on Rhode Island because the Republican and Democratic contests might be decided by the time Rhode Islanders vote.

“There is reason to believe this will be over by the time we have our primary,” she said. “We are not in the main game here because we are not in Super Tuesday.”

Moakley said she was “chagrined” Rhode Island did not move its primary date from March 4 to Feb. 5, which is becoming known as “Super-Duper Tuesday” as more states move their presidential primaries to that date.

The state Senate passed a bill in May that would have moved Rhode Island’s primary to Feb. 5, but the bill stalled in the House. The General Assembly did approve the bill in a special one-day session in October, but Governor Carcieri vetoed it, saying there was no opportunity for public testimony, election deadlines were bearing down and local boards of canvassers would have faced unexpected and difficult burdens.

Moakley said Governor Patrick of Massachusetts recommended moving his state’s primary to Super Tuesday a week after Carcieri issued his veto, and Massachusetts is now part of Super Tuesday.

Rather than focusing on Rhode Island, some second-tier candidates might now concentrate on Massachusetts and other Super Tuesday states, Moakley said. “All candidates can’t be everywhere,” she said. “They are picking and choosing, and for some of them, they are not picking Rhode Island.”

efitzpat@projo.com