By Sheahan Virgin, FairVote Democracy Fellow
Though the process by which the major parties select their nominees for president has democratized considerably since the bygone days of the ignominious "smoke-filled room"--within which powerful, deal-cutting party barons, rather than voters, determined the national ticket--it remains a system that inequitably prioritizes certain citizens over others.
Today's barons in the primaries are not party elites puffing on cigars, but everyday voters in Iowa and New Hampshire--farmers, schoolteachers, laborers, and small business owners transformed into political kingpins--who have the good fortune to live in states that host the first two electoral contests in the nomination battles of both major political parties.
Alarmingly, Iowa and New Hampshire comprise just 1.4% of the national population, and neither is demographically representative of the nation, being 91.3% and 93.9% white, respectively. Yet despite being neither populous nor diverse, every four years Iowans and New Hampshirites wield tremendous power, determining for the nation which presidential candidates are allowed to continue on and which are instructed to close shop and go home.
The reason is obvious: the Iowa Caucus and the New Hampshire Primary confer enormous benefits on candidates who either meet or exceed expectations, giving them forward momentum while the remaining candidates see the money dry up, the television cameras disappear, and the crowds thin as the media instructs voters to look elsewhere. While Iowa and New Hampshire may not necessarily pick a party's eventual nominee (or agree with each other, for that matter), they always shrink the field.
Another consequence of Iowa/New Hampshire momentum is that it often gives a candidate the ability to steamroll to the nomination. Indeed, in the majority of nomination contests over the past half century, a party's eventual nominee has often gotten a firm grip on the nomination early in the process, leaving voters in the remaining states the primarily ceremonial task of ratifying the decision the early states already have taken.
The ability of Iowa and New Hampshire to winnow presidential fields and coronate frontrunners is often thought to be desirable, both allowing surviving candidates more oxygen and eliminating allegedly nonviable candidates who heretofore have cluttered the stage. Party establishments, moreover, find such winnowing/coronating power beneficial, as a swift nomination battle between prospective candidates allows for an earlier pivot to the general election campaign.
An alternative perspective, however, is that investment of such power in two states is not only inequitable, but highly undemocratic. Why should a handful Iowans and New Hampshirites have the right to speak on behalf of an entire nation? Can we be certain they have eliminated candidates who would not have performed better in states with different demographic compositions or political traditions? And why, just because Iowa and New Hampshire find a particular candidate a compelling nominee, should the rest of America simply trust their judgment--especially when eliminated candidates express dissenting viewpoints that would not otherwise have been aired within a constrained two-party system.
Democrats in 2004: Dean, Clark, and Gephardt
To get proverbial for a moment, if one person's trash could be another's treasure, could not one state's also-ran be another state's breakout star, and vice versa? When a lackluster performance in Iowa or New Hampshire forces a candidate out of a nomination battle prematurely, voters in other states never have the opportunity to evaluate formally this individual--which under a truly democratic system, they should possess. Similarly, when a candidate leaves Iowa and New Hampshire as the prohibitive nominee--the media already salivating over a projected general election matchup--other states are denied any ability to influence the race.
Looking at primary campaigns from the preceding decade, we see races characterized not by protraction, but by brevity--in which Iowa and New Hampshire have played decisive rolls.
In 2004, Howard Dean's bid for the Democratic nomination fell victim to the one-two Iowa/New Hampshire punch of a resurgent John Kerry--though Dean lingered on for another couple contests. Richard Gephardt ended his campaign following a fourth place finish in Iowa, while Joseph Lieberman exited the race just a week after New Hampshire. Though both John Edwards and Wesley Clark continued deeper into the schedule, neither had a realistic chance of catching Kerry, the post Iowa/New Hampshire momentum of whom was too great to overcome.
Republicans in 2008: Romney, Thompson, and Giuliani
True, the 2008 Democratic primary between Hillary Clinton and Barack
Obama evolved into a frenetic delegate-driven battle of attrition that
went down to the final states on the schedule, but this was a deviation
from the norm; and even so, Iowa and New Hampshire maintained their
winnowing power, with Joseph Biden and Christopher Dodd withdrawing
following poor Iowa showings and Bill Richardson pulling out after New
Hampshire. John Edwards, meanwhile, was unable to attract much attention
as a result of Obama's post-Iowa hype and Clinton's post-New Hampshire
publicity; they had momentum, and he didn't.
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