Presidential Elections

1. Presidential Elections • Primary elections or caucuses are used to elect national convention delegates which choose the nominee. • Winner-take-all primary • Proportional representation primary • Proportional representation with bonus delegates primary; beauty contest with separate delegate selection; delegate selection with no beauty contest • Caucus

2. Primaries v. Caucuses • Over years, trend has been to use primaries rather than caucuses to choose delegates. • Caucus is the oldest, most party-oriented method of choosing delegates to the national conventions. • Arguments for primaries • More democratic • More representative • A rigorous test for the candidate • Arguments for caucuses • Caucus participants more informed; more interactive and informative • Frontloading (being first) gives some primary states an advantage • Frontloading is the tendency to choose an early date on the primary schedule

3. The Party Conventions • Out-of-power party holds its convention first, in late July, followed in mid-August by party holding the presidency. • Conventions were decision-making body in the 19th century. • Today the convention is fundamentally different. Nominations settled well in advance of the convention.

4. National Convention: Delegate Selections • Unit Rule • A traditional party practice under which the majority of a state delegation can fore the minority to vote for its candidate • Abolished by the Democrats • New Democratic party rule decrees that state’s delegates be chosen in proportion to the voters cast in its primary or caucus. (30% of votes = 30% delegates from that state) – proportional allocation • Superdelegates • Delegate slot to the Democratic Party’s national convention that is reserved for an elected party official • Some rules originating in Democratic Party have been enacted as state laws thus applying them to the Republican Party as well.

5. National Convention: National Candidates and Issues • Political perceptions and loyalties of voters are not influenced largely by national candidates and issues. • Diminished the power of state and local party leaders at the convention. • Issues are more important to the new, issue-oriented party activists than to the party professionals. • Party professionals no longer have monopoly on managing party affairs.

6. National Conventions: The News Media • Changing nature of coverage • No prime time coverage on some days • Extending coverage on the final day of each convention • Reflects change in political culture • More interest in the candidates themselves • Convention still generates much coverage for the party

7. The National Convention: Who are the Delegates? • Parties draw delegates from an elite group • Higher income and educational levels • Differences between parties • 40% Democratic delegates were minorities; 50% women (1980 rule requires half state delegation be female) • Only 17% Republican delegates were minorities. Up from 9% in 2000.

8. Figure 13.1

9. The Electoral College • Representatives of each state who cast the final ballots that actually elect a president • Total number of electors for each state equal to the number of senators and representatives that a state has in the U.S. Congress • District of Columbia is given 3 electoral votes.

10. The Electoral College • Result of compromise • Selection by Congress versus direct popular election • Three essentials to understanding the design of the Electoral College: • Constructed to work without political parties. • Constructed to cover both the nominating and electing phases of presidential selection. • Constructed to produce a nonpartisan president.

11. The Electoral College in the 19th Century • 12th Amendment (1804) • Attempt to remedy the confusion between the selection of vice presidents and presidents that emerged in the election 1800 • Provided for separate elections for each office, with each elector having only one vote to cast for each • In event of a tie, the election still went to the House. • Top three candidates go to House. Each state House delegation casts one vote.

12. The Electoral College Today • Apportionment matters. • Representation of states in the Electoral College is altered every ten years to reflect population shifts. • Recent apportionment has favored the Republicans. • With the exception of California, George W. Bush carried all of the states that gained seats in 2000.

13. The Electoral College: Three Major Reform Ideas • Abolition • Congressional District Plan • Keep the College, Abolish the Electors

14. Patterns of Presidential Elections • Party Realignments • A shifting of party coalition groupings in the electorate that remains in place for several elections • Critical elections • An election that signals a party realignment through voter polarization • Six party realignments in U.S. history; three associated with tumultuous elections • 1860 • 1890s • 1928-1936 • Secular Realignments • The gradual rearrangement of party coalitions, based more on demographic shifts than on shocks to the political system

15. Electoral College Results for Three Realigning Presidential Contests

16. Reforming the Electoral Process • Focus on the Electoral College • Other areas • Nomination • Regional primaries • Campaign Finance • Internet Voting • Standardizing Recounts • Ballot Reform