I’ve decided for various reasons not to blog much on the Democratic primary season this year. Here in England I am relatively isolated from a lot of the news, advertisements, and the nuances that one can catch only if one is actually in the United States.
However, yesterday the primary season was over. Senator Obama is almost certainly the Democratic nominee for President of the United States. So, for the benefit of my non-US readers I’d like to ruminate on party primaries and why they are almost certainly the best way to pick a candidate.
Before 1964, many states, rather than holding free primary elections or caucuses, selected their delegates in a closed party convention. Often these delegates were pledged to a local worthy (often a Senator or Governor). This was normally not a serious bid for the nomination, and everyone knew it. The real reason this was done was to give the state clout in the administration of the eventual nominee if he ended up in the White House. Conventions were rumbustious affairs, with lots of cigar-smoke-filled rooms full of politicos horse-trading convention votes for patronage. This was the case up until 1960, when I believe there were still some of these “favourite son” pledged delegates floating around. They disappeared in 1964 and have not been seen since. When there aren’t any smoke-filled rooms, there’s nothing to trade.
It must be said that some of these conventions before 1964 picked great candidates, some of whom made great Presidents. Truman, FDR, Wilson, to name a few.
Since 1964, we have had Hubert Humphrey, picked by caucus and primary, who had the millstone of LBJ around his neck and lost to Nixon. In 1972 we had McGovern, who lost every state except Massachusetts, and the District of Columbia. We were proud to say “Don’t blame me–I’m from Massachusetts. As a result of this drubbing, superdelegates (various party and elected officials) were added to the mix, so that if the party faithful were fickle enough to support a loser in the primaries the superdelegates could make them see sense and nominate someone who was electable.
Carter was electable in 1976 but not in 1980, when he was drubbed by Reagan. Mondale came to a similar fate in 1984, and Dukakis in 1988 against George Bush the First. Clinton won twice in 1992 and 1996, but Gore lost in 2000 (perhaps, if the hanging chads had hung another way or more Democrats been on the Supreme Court, it might have gone the other way) and Kerry in 2004.
So we get to 2008. The primary season has been the most brutal I can remember in years. Mud-slinging on all sides, bad blood, slips of the tongue that were pretty hurtful, again on both sides. Interference by ministers and priests that embarrassed one candidate so much that he resigned from his church. Echoes of past peccadillos and perhaps current ones on the other side (there’s tabloid news about Bill Clinton spending some time with an actress out west somewhere) tar the other candidate’s brush. The contest comes down to the superdelegates, and one candidate wins only through getting more of them than the other. In the event, the people’s choices over these last few months have been “trumped” or “confirmed” by the superdelegates on their own.
So what to do? Clinton is left with about $20 million in debts and nearly half the delegates. Obama is left with aq huge warchest and more than half the delegates, just. Clinton has not conceded, and Obama is not publicly asking her to, preferring to concentrate on the November election.
So why do I think that the present system of caucuses/primaries is the best way to select a Presidential candidate?
There have been several alternatives proposed. One single national primary, on the same day, in all 50 states and the territories, is something that to foreigners and some Americans, sounds attractive. However, the difficulty with that system would be that no candidate would have a chance to build momentum during the long primary season. No one would be able to slug it out over a months-long set of state campaigns and thus demonstrate that s/he had the staying power and the will to survive the gruelling job of President. Instead we would be left with a French-lite election, with a first and second round. This would also obviate the Federal system of government as states would not be able to exert influence singly or in groups owing to the same-day primary. Candidates would not visit smaller states, preferring to visit larger states at the expense of smaller ones.
Regional primaries have also been proposed. These would group states into regions, with 4 or 5 different primaries on spaces days. This would obviate the momentum exception, but yet again, smaller states in a region would be underwhelmed by candidates, who would spend time in the larger states of a region and depend on overspill from the larger states’ media.