Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Presidential Primary and Caucus Dates Over Time

[Editor's Note: After having gotten similar feedback on the maps from some folks here at UGA today, I thought I'd attempt to edit them. They were nice in isolation -- if you had the time to learn and discern the color coding -- but for showing a trend quickly, the original colors weren't cutting it. So I decided to take Matthew up on his suggestion and see if I could make a six shade gradient work. I think it does. You can definitely see a stark contrast between 1976 and 2008 if you toggle back and forth between the two at the end of the slideshow. Here, for the sake of a reminding everyone, are the rules for reading the maps.]

This weekend I put together a few maps for a job talk and class lecture I'm doing later this week on frontloading and thought I'd share them with everyone. The slideshow below has the states color-coded based on the month in which their delegate selection event occurred in the elections from 1976-2008. You'll see that some states are divided with two separate colors in some years. That reflects the different dates on which Democratic and Republican states held (in most cases) their respective caucuses. Though there are states that had primaries for one party and caucuses for the other. In those instances where the state is divided, the left half color corresponds to the Democratic contest date and the right color, the Republicans'.




Recent Posts:
Presidential Primary and Caucus Dates Over Time (Take 1)

New Jersey in 2012

Out of Committee and On to the Floor: Back to May for the Arkansas Presidential Primary

Monday, January 26, 2009

Presidential Primary and Caucus Dates Over Time (Take 1)

NOTE: For an updated version (with better color-coding) please see here and for the full calendars in each of these election years, please see the left sidebar.

This weekend I put together a few maps for a job talk and class lecture I'm doing later this week on frontloading and thought I'd share them with everyone. The slideshow below has the states color-coded based on the month in which their delegate selection event occurred in the elections from 1976-2008. You'll see that some states are divided with two separate colors in some years. That reflects the different dates on which Democratic and Republican states held (in most cases) their respective caucuses. Though there are states that had primaries for one party and caucuses for the other. In those instances where the state is divided, the left half color corresponds to the Democratic contest date and the right color, the Republicans'.



When I get a chance, I'll post these in one of the sidebars so that they'll constantly be there for easy access.


Recent Posts:
New Jersey in 2012

Out of Committee and On to the Floor: Back to May for the Arkansas Presidential Primary

Illinois in 2012

Wednesday, January 21, 2009

New Jersey in 2012

You have now entered the speculative zone. Oklahoma and Illinois were one thing, but this is quite another. FHQ finds it helpful to do exercises in hypotheticals from time to time, but this one may be a stretch. Yet, when I came across this discussion about New Jersey's 2009 governor's race, it triggered a memory of a recent addition to the law governing the Garden state's presidential primary.

Now bear with me here...

The bill (A3186) keeps the date of the now separate presidential primary on the same first-Tuesday-in-February date, but now allows for the secretary of state to shift the date should it coincide with a "period of religious observance" that imposes "a substantial burden on an individual's ability to vote."

Now, I'm not sure about what religious observances may pop up during the first week in Tuesday in February 2012. And I certainly don't see the state of New Jersey being motivated to shift its presidential primary again, especially since just the Republican nomination will be at stake. But what if New Jersey Republicans were able to unseat Democratic Governor Jon Corzine? It isn't likely to happen if you listen to the folks over at Daily Kos, but the catch here is that the office of secretary of state in New Jersey is not an elective office. It is a position appointed by the governor. If that governor was a Republican would the administration be motivated to move the primary forward -- likely in violation of either parties' rules -- thus challenging the language of the new law?

Yeah, I didn't think it was likely either. New Jersey would be a nice medium to large chunk of delegates for one well-positioned candidate after New Hampshire, though. It is a winner-take-all primary after all.

We'll see. My bet is that Arkansas moves back to May over New Jersey ultimately pulling the trigger on this scheme.


Recent Posts:
Out of Committee and On to the Floor: Back to May for the Arkansas Presidential Primary

Illinois in 2012

Inauguration Day

Out of Committee and On to the Floor: Back to May for the Arkansas Presidential Primary

The bill to move the Arkansas presidential primary back to May in 2012 has passed the House State Agencies and Governmental Affairs Committee and now moves to the floor for a vote. HB 1021 would move the presidential primary back to coincide with the primaries for state and local offices usually held in late May. After getting lost in the shuffle in 2008, Arkansas is making the move largely as a cost-saving measure. The bill has had bi-partisan support and Democratic Governor Mike Bebee has already signaled that he would sign the bill into law should it reach his desk.

Quick four years ago, Arkansas once again will be among the first to reposition with the 2012 presidential primary season in mind.


Recent Posts:
Illinois in 2012

Inauguration Day

Oklahoma in 2012

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Illinois in 2012

Yesterday we took a glance at the prospects for presidential primary change in 2012 in Oklahoma. Today FHQ shifts the focus northward to the newly inaugurated president's home state of Illinois. While the Sooner state has a new bill before its legislature to place more of the financial burden of the conducting the state's presidential primary to the parties, Illinois is taking the Arkansas approach (potentially moving to a later date) but for different reasons. The experiment in Arkansas was one in which the presidential primary was not only moved but split off from the Natural state's primaries for state and local offices. Illinois opted instead to move its all-everything primary from mid-March to the first week in February in 2008. That made for an extremely early congressional primary (and lengthy general election campaign).

But State Senator Dale Rissinger has introduced legislation to move everything the primaries for state and local offices back in 2012 (SB46). No, not back into March as in 2004, but all the way back to June at the end of the process. In Arkansas the frontloading move was a failure both financially and from an influence standpoint, but in Illinois, the delegate boost the state legislature foresaw the state's primary potentially handing its native son actually came to pass. Obama needed those delegates on Super Tuesday to stay even with the delegate advantages Hillary Clinton was getting in places like New York and California during the onslaught of delegate selection events on February 5.

[Editor's note: The following was a hypothetical scenario analysis included when it looked as if this bill included the presidential primary in the move to June as well. This bill however, simply moves the primaries for state and local offices while leaving the presidential primary in February.]

And it is interesting that Republicans on the state legislative level are pushing these plans forward. In Arkansas there doesn't appear to be any ulterior motive, but in Illinois [It is Illinois after all.] a scenario can be envisioned where a vulnerable President Obama gets a primary challenge and doesn't have a home state to lean on with it falling at the tail end of primary season. [Consider, for example, President Carter's administration in the lead up to 1980 persuading Georgia and Alabama to move up to where Florida was in 1976 to counteract the likely boost Ted Kennedy would have gotten in the northeastern primaries in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. It has happened.] Is that likely? Probably not, especially if the Democrats want to have any hope of winning a general election under such circumstances. But that's something to keep tabs on as this bill navigates the Illinois senate.

Tomorrow: New Jersey.


Recent Posts:
Inauguration Day

Oklahoma in 2012

End of Unannounced/Unintended Hiatus

Inauguration Day

I would be remiss if I didn't say at least something of the day the United States just encountered. FHQ often focuses on the means, but today was about ends. Today was one of those days where the means come to their ends; a day where campaigns and elections come to fruition.

Everyone can hope on day one, but the real work begins tomorrow.

...and no, I don't necessarily mean on initial re-election efforts. Well, 2012 is in the back of my mind, I suppose.


Recent Posts:
Oklahoma in 2012

End of Unannounced/Unintended Hiatus

A One State Presidential Election in 2012?

Monday, January 19, 2009

Oklahoma in 2012

The bills regarding the presidential primaries of 2012 are already starting to be filed in several state legislatures across the country. Arkansas has been talking for almost a year about moving its newly established presidential primary from February back to May to coincide with its primaries for state and local offices. But now several states are starting to look at not only the timing of these contests but other issues as well. This week we'll look at three such states: Oklahoma, Illinois and New Jersey.

One thing we can say about states that attempt to move so early in the process is that they often aren't successful. Between 2000 and 2002, for instance, there were 26 bills before state legislatures that would have changed the timing of those states' delegate selection events, but only one was successful according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. In 2003, though, there were 23 bills, of which, eight passed. One out of every three bill proposed passing in the year before the primaries are to be conducted is far better than the one in twenty-six chance the bills prior to 2003 had. The period between 2004 and 2008 was much the same. There was an unusual amount of successful early action, but it paled in comparison to all the movement that was witnessed in 2007. In other words, this is a long way of saying that you have to take much of this legislative action with a grain of salt (...and New Jersey hasn't even had any legislative action. In fact, much of the story on New Jersey is simply speculative at this point. There's a bit of a quirk in the law the legislature passed last year refining the timing of the presidential primary there. I'll get to that later, however.). What we do have are three interesting situations in three different states that are worth talking about.

In the Sooner state, the bill that has been filed does not deal with the timing of the state's presidential primary in 2012. The primary will still be held on the first Tuesday in February (February 7, 2012). Instead, HB 1340, sponsored by Republican Rep. Charles Key, would shift the financial burden for carrying out the primary from the state to the political parties that desire to be included on the ballot. This would put Oklahoma in a situation that is the opposite of the system that emerged in South Carolina for the 2008 cycle. South Carolina, for years has held either a party-run caucus or primary for allocating national party delegates for the purposes of presidential nominations. The parties were charged with footing the bill(s) for the contest(s). Prior to 2008, though, the South Carolina legislature passed and then overrode a gubernatorial veto to grant the state power to conduct presidential primary elections, but to also have them foot the bill. The parties maintained the ability to set the date of the election, though, to ensure that South Carolina remained the earliest primary in the South.

If, however, this bill is to pass the Oklahoma legislature and be signed into law (Republicans control both the House and the Senate in the legislature, but Democratic Governor Brad Henry may have something to say about whether the bill becomes a law.), Oklahoma could establish a model for other states to follow in these increasingly difficult economic times. The state in essence is saying, "We'll run the show, but only if you put up the money." [Alternately, South Carolina said, "We'll run the show and take the bill, but you [the parties] set the date."] And that certainly makes sense in a state where the presidential primaries and the primaries for state and local offices are separate. The presidential primary is a matter of party business and not necessarily in the domain of the states. State legislatures having control of presidential primaries in most states is simply a function of the fallout from the McGovern-Fraser reforms that were put in place in 1972. States had to come into compliance with the new rules and in most cases, the easiest way to accomplish that was to combine it with the primary elections for state and local offices -- a decision controlled by the state legislatures.

If, then, Oklahoma pulls the trigger on this bill, the example would certainly be set for other states to follow suit. Again, though, there would potentially be some variation in terms of how able states are in following the Sooner state's lead. States like Oklahoma, where the presidential primary is a separate election, would likely find it easier to pull this off than in states like North Carolina or Indiana or Texas where every elective office at stake has a primary on the same day. I suppose the latter states could simple call for parties to assist in paying the costs of the primary. And in the end, that is all HB 1340 in Oklahoma is asking, not for the parties to take on all the costs, but to take on most of them. The level would just potentially be lower in the states with concurrent primaries for president and state and local offices.

This bill, though, is certainly worth tracking.

I'll be back tomorrow with a look at the situation in Illinois for 2012. And I suppose that is fitting on the day the Land of Lincoln sees its favorite son inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States.


Recent Posts:
End of Unannounced/Unintended Hiatus

A One State Presidential Election in 2012?

A Projected 2012 Electoral College Map (version 2.0)

Saturday, January 17, 2009

End of Unannounced/Unintended Hiatus

Well, 2009 has been a whirlwind thus far for me. I spent the first week of the year putting the final touches on my classes for this semester and preparing for the Southern Political Science Association's meeting in New Orleans. And this past week I've had some things start moving for me on the job front. [Always a good sign in a horrible year on the political science job market.]

Anyway, there has been some chatter in a few states regarding their 2012 presidential primaries of late and I'd like to take them all one-by-one in the coming days to discuss the particulars and the potential for an overall trend between 2008 and 2012. Plus, I'd like to make a few comments about the paper I put together for the aforementioned SPSA meeting. Believe it or not it is frontloading-related. And finally, the race for the chair of the GOP is heating up. If I get a chance to get around to it, I'd like to put some stuff together on this as well.

In the meantime, let me point you all in the direction of a couple of interesting links:
1) The Monkey Cage this past week has had a dialog going between their regular contributors and the authors of several pieces on the 2008 election that have appeared in the latest edition of The Forum. The original post is linked above and you can follow the rest of the discussion in their archives. Some good stuff.

2) Princeton political scientist, Nolan McCarty, has started a blog and has had some interesting material so far. He and Rose Razaghian had a paper in the American Journal of Political Science about a decade ago concerning advice and consent within the Senate during the confirmations of presidential nominees (cabinet-level and lower positions). So I keep waiting for him to weigh in on some of the confirmation battles. Whether he does or doesn't is immaterial. The posts are worth a look and the blog is worth tracking.

Recent Posts:
A One State Presidential Election in 2012?

A Projected 2012 Electoral College Map (version 2.0)

The Race for RNC Chair