Presidential Nominations, Superdelegates, Brokered Conventions – A Primer

The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ASPA as an organization.

By Robert Brescia
August 5, 2024

Elections are the business of the people—but the nomination is more properly the business of the parties—or is it? Political party conventions are on our minds lately. The Republicans had theirs on July 15^th and the Democrats will have theirs on August 19^th. We are breaking new ground (at least for this generation) because of President Biden’s decision to drop out of the race. Let’s start out with a basic 5-question True/False quiz!

1. The rules that govern the convention/delegate processes are codified in the U.S. Constitution.
2. The Democratic Party requires a two-thirds majority of delegates to select a candidate on the first ballot.
3. The last ‘brokered” convention was exactly 100 years ago (1924).
4. Democrat Party “superdelegates” are allowed to vote for a candidate on the first ballot.
5. An open convention is where the party’s candidate has not been decided prior to the convention.

Defining our terms.

A regular convention process is where parties hold primaries and candidates are pledged by regular delegates who then travel to the national conventions to relay those pledges. In some states, delegates are bound to pledge the candidate at the national party convention that they pledged at their state primaries—others are un-bound.

A brokered convention is where the party does not choose a candidate on the first round of balloting at the national convention. When this happens, delegates are released from their previous pledges. The last time a convention had to go past the first ballot was in 1952.

An open convention is just another term for a brokered convention. Formerly pledged Biden delegates are not legally bound to support Harris, leaving the door open for a different candidate to gather support if there is an open convention.

A contested convention is one where the candidate is not decided clearly enough prior to the start of the convention. Examples include the 1968 Democrat and Republican conventions.

The Democrat Party’s Superdelegates

The superdelegate system is traceable to the early 1980s. Senator Walter Mondale supported these processes brought about by the Hunt Commission and the Democratic National Committee. When Jesse Jackson picked up speed and momentum in the 1988 primaries, the party machine again kicked in to ensure that no mavericks or outsiders would be allowed in the inner circle of the party.

Superdelegates have tremendous and practically unbridled power. State delegations select the superdelegates and you can bet that there’s a lot of jockeying for these highly desirable positions of influence and power. Some are celebrities, some are long-time party servants, while others are elected office holders. They are all sponsored into the superdelegate ranks by other powerful people. Former President Bill Clinton, for example, is a Democratic Party “Distinguished Party Leader” superdelegate, or DPL as well as a host of other similar personalities. Some have questioned whether this is a fair and democratic way to elect a party’s nominee.

The founders didn’t envision the two-party system that we evolved into, so they didn’t include any language about it. The Democrats and Republicans of our times are free to select a candidate any way that they choose. Hypothetically, they could just name someone and skip all the debates and voting process. Ah, but the state primaries serve to provide a rational basis for selection so that the party can generally rest assured that the candidate will have popular voting support in the general elections.

Recommended Improvements

I believe, therefore, that both parties’ superdelegate systems should be dismantled leaving only pledged delegates who are apportioned by the results of the popular vote within the states’ primaries. The caucuses should also be discontinued, and states’ party leadership encouraged to adopt a primary voting process. The primacy of the states should be respected for the primary vote. In other words, delegates should be apportioned to candidates at the state level, not any level below that, such as a congressional district.

The timing of the states’ primaries should be standardized. They should not take over three months to complete. Debates need to be held so that the voters can see and appreciate the differences among the candidates and then the voting should take place during the last week of that month. Political party conventions should be held about a month after the last primary voting round.

Answers to True/False quiz:

1. FALSE: The rules for conventions are established by each political party.
2. FALS: Since 1936, a simple majority is sufficient. This came about after the 1924 Democratic convention where it took 103 ballots to select a candidate.
3. TRUE: Although some say that both the Democrats and the Republicans had open conventions in 1968. My belief is that the 1968 conventions were not open/brokered because Hubert Humphrey (D) and Richard Nixon (R) were both solidly pledged prior to their conventions and won on the first ballot.
4. FALSE: As of 2018, Democratic superdelegates will participate only if no winner emerges after the first round of balloting.
5. TRUE: Vice Presidents Hubert Humphrey (1968) and Kamala Harris (2024) are both examples of this phenomenon.

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Author: Dr. Robert Brescia is a National Board Certified Teacher (NBCT), serving as Social Studies Department Head at Permian High School in Odessa, TX. The Governor of Texas re-appointed him to the State Board for Educator Certification (SBEC) for a six-year term. Bob has a doctoral degree with distinction in Executive Leadership from The George Washington University. He also teaches ethics to university students and leadership to organizations. Contact him at [email protected].

 

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