After more than one month from the official kick-off of the US primary season, for the first time in many years there are not two clear Presidential candidates for November’s general election, after most states held their primaries. While the situation at the Republican field is quite clear, we might have to wait until the Democratic Party’s convention to actually know who is going to run against John McCain. Pundits believe that the contest between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama is different from any other contest of the past and that their competition is not going to harm the Party at the general election. However, analyzing closely all primary seasons since 1972 (the year when Presidential primaries began to spread around the country), it can be stated that the use of primary elections to select Presidential candidates is a very useful tool to define national leadership within the political parties. However, excessive competition could harm a party at the general election.

 

All great general elections débacles of the last 30 years were indeed preceded by tough competition during the primary season, while the other party had a clear candidate at an early stage. In 1972 George McGovern had to fight against Hubert Humphrey, Edmund Muskie and George Wallace before obtaining the democratic nomination, while President Nixon faced only token opposition. The result was Nixon’s outstanding victory, notwithstanding the – still unclear, at the time – Watergate scandal. Four years later, in 1976, the incumbent President Jerry Ford was more than embarrassed by the outstanding performance of a rising Republican conservative star called Ronald Reagan, while the black horse Jimmy Carter locked his nomination with no major problems. In the following Presidential election it was Carter that faced strong opposition within his party by Ted Kennedy, while Ronald Reagan got the nomination and brought in his ticket his major adversary George Bush. In 1984 Walter Mondale’s fight for the nomination was tough against Gary Hart, and his defeat against the unopposed incumbent Republican President Ronald Reagan was even tougher. Four years later the Democrats made the same mistake again, with a number of regional candidates undermining Michael Dukakis’ race during the primary season and they lost the third Presidential election in a row. In 1992 George Bush’s performance against Pat Buchanan was not the best, and the incumbent President lost the general election, while in 1996 Bill Clinton’s party support was stronger and arrived earlier than Bob Dole’s. George W. Bush in 2000 is an exception – all that election was very particular indeed – but one can state that Al Gore didn’t try to sell himself as the heir of the Clinton administration. Finally, in 2004 the GOP supported unconditionally George W. Bush, while John Kerry fought a little bit for the Democratic nomination.

 

The point of this brief retrospective summary is to show that primary elections can be useful to build effective leadership within large political parties. They are indeed the most simple way to find with a democratic method a strong leader able to unite the party factions for a national election. However, taking a harsh fight too long can be dangerous for the party. It is useless to say now that the differences between Clinton and Obama are not that great, and that the overwhelming majority of Clinton supporters would vote for Obama, should he get the nomination, and vice-versa. It is useless because unfortunately the great majority of voters are not that concerned about political platforms, they are much more interested in people and personalities. And as much as the candidates try to “keep it clean” – and it seems that until now they are actually doing a quite good job – it is absolutely impossible to avoid incidents, such as the resignation of Samantha Power, the now infamous Obama aid that called Hillary Clinton “a monster”. The whole point is that this primary season is taking too long to come to an end at the Democratic side and that could be dangerous for the party.

 

The worst possible outcome is indeed to have the final decision made by the “superdelegates”. Superdelegates are Party leaders that according to the Democratic Party rules are uncommitted delegates at the national convention. More than 20% of all Democrat delegates are “superdelegates”, and in a very close race such as this one these people could decide the nomination. This would be by all means the worse possible outcome: have a Presidential candidate chosen by a group of privileged people and not by the voters. Last time something like that happened was during the Democratic national convention in 1968. It was before the reform process that gave life to the current Presidential candidate nominating process, but in that occasion state party leaders simply decided to nominate Vice-president Hubert Humphrey that collected virtually no popular support, comparing to Gene McCarthy, George McGovern or, even worse, to the late Bobby Kennedy. The result at the time was simply terrible: a number of riots broke out in Chicago – the city where the convention was held – and the major outcome of these protests was the reform of the entire nominating system of Presidential candidates. Therefore, a decision by superdelegates overturning the decision made by the voters is something that should be regarded as a very remote possibility. It is more likely that all – or almost all – superdelegates decide to support the winner of the highest number of “committed” delegates, no matter how close the victory will be.

 

The only person that could bring a little bit of certainty in this complex situation is Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House. A superdelegate herself, Ms. Pelosi is the highest ranking Democratic elected official. The Speaker of the House is indeed third-in-line at the Presidential succession, above her there is only the Vice-president of the United States. In her institutional and political position, she could try to get a strong commitment by the majority of superdelegates, or a least publicly ask them to throw their support to the “popular winner”, whoever it may be. Taking a strong position on this matter could be interpreted as an excessive pressure over people that according to the Party’s rules have the right to chose freely who to support, but it would also be a strong commitment towards the respect of the decision of the voters.