For this week’s culture focus, I thought I’d give a brief introduction to the U.S. political system. Eligible American citizens have started the process of determining whom they want to see as the Republican nominee for the Presidential election to be held on November 6, 2012. Each state holds either a primary or a caucus to determine which candidates will receive delegates to the national conventions that will be held later in the year. The Democratic Party and the Republic party each have separate primaries/caucuses, generally held on the same day. Democratic delegates will attend the 2012 Democratic National Convention from September 3 – 6 in Charlotte, North Carolina. The Republican delegates will attend the 2012 Republican National Convention from August 27 – 30 in Tampa, Florida.
Last week, Iowa officially started the 2012 Presidential election cycle by holding its caucuses. Yesterday, New Hampshire held the nation’s first Presidential primary. Caucuses and primaries are both used to select delegates for the Democratic and Republican National Conventions, but caucuses are quite different from primaries. Primaries are conducted much like a regular election. How about caucuses?
In a caucus, people in a certain area (usually some local political district, such as a township or a precinct) get together and discuss as a group which candidate they think deserves their support. Different people may speak to the group on behalf of a particular candidate, seeking to persuade others to support that candidate as well. After discussion, the caucus participants cast their vote for the candidate of their choice. Properly speaking, the people vote for delegates for that particular candidate, and these are the delegates that will go to a county convention and/or the national convention. (Some caucuses are more complicated than what I’ve just described here, but this description gives you the general idea.)
Perhaps one reason why caucuses are more complicated than primaries is because they are an older method of selecting delegates for the political conventions. One drawback of such a system is that caucuses are more open to influence to control from party leaders. Consequently, many states switched over to a primary system, beginning with Florida in 1901. Today, only a handful of states still hold caucuses rather than primaries: Alaska, Colorado, Hawaii, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana (Democrats, Republicans hold a Primary), Maine, Minnesota, Montana (Republicans, Democrats hold a Primary, Nebraska (Democrats, Republicans hold a Primary), Nevada, North Dakota, Washington, and Wyoming.