Comments on: Do the Iowa Caucus and New Hampshire Primary Matter?

By: Sue

Sue — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 00:39:52 +0000

The Iowa caucus was a relevant race for Democrats in 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 2000 and 2004. The New Hampshire Primaries were relevant for Democrats in 1952, 1956, 1960, 1968 (but see below), 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992 and 2000. Out of the eight relevant Iowa caucuses, the winner went on to become the nominee four times. Of the eleven relevant New Hampshire primaries, six of the winners became the party’s nominee.

By: chezjake

chezjake — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 17:33:25 +0000

Chris’s comment brings up another point. Earlier on, and to a certain extent still today, having Iowa and NH start things off allowed candidates to test the waters without having to raise huge wads of cash. With the way the media are turning the presidential race into a two-year marathon now, that’s not as easy any more.It also bothers me that although the media have been fairly decent at covering at least 5 Republican candidates, they essentially reduced the Democrats to 3 candidates beginning last spring — coverage of Richardson, for example, has been almost non-existent except in the debates. Many of the polls didn’t even report results for anyone but Clinton, Obama, and Edwards.

By: Chris Hanson

Chris Hanson — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 15:44:50 +0000

Another thing to consider (new to 2008 if i’m not mistaken) is that the early caucuses can expand the number of relevant candidates. Mike huckabee would probably have been a no chance candidate if it weren’t for his victories in Iowa. He probably wouldn’t have spent as much money (indeed, he wouldn’t have as much money to spend) in NH if he hadn’t won in Iowa.

By: Greg Laden

Greg Laden — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 14:01:02 +0000

chezjake:To some extent your first question is the obverse of what I was looking at: If a candidate is wiped out in this early stage, can they keep running and win. I think there are three kind of candidates in this regard: Two kinds of front runners and everybody else. Whoever ends up in the everybody else range is no longer viable.Regarding your second question, one could argue that post 1968 is the cutoff for relevancy. The modern system is pretty recent. The problem, though, is that with a race every 4 years, and for a given party the primary system not being relevant at all in a given year, there is very little data.There are other differences between the early races and later that I did not discuss (I really tried to limit what I was doing here). For instance, the total number of candidates in NH or Iowa is typically smaller in the earlier years than in the later years.Personally, I think that 1968 was a pretty scary year for American Politics. The Dem convention was violent. One of the candidates (earlier in the process) was murdered. The streets were virtually and sometimes literally on fire. The post 1968 system is, I feel, very much a response to that transition, with significant efforts to make things more calm and systematic.But, it is still true that we hear on a daily basis during the early primaries how important the New Hampshire Primary or the Iowa Caucus is. Or, we hear how unimportant each is. It all depends on who is taking, when, and why. My effort here was simply to put a couple of numbers together to see if there was actually a pattern that could be referred to.To me, the answer is this: Yes, there is a pattern and these political events matter, but no, they are nothing close to determinative.Thanks for your comments.

By: chezjake

chezjake — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 13:39:38 +0000

One function of the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary that you didn’t consider or discuss is simply that of narrowing the field of candidates for the following primaries. I suspect that if you look at the overall results for the top two candidates in those races you’ll find that in the vast majority those early contests have weeded out the non-viable contestants.I’m also unsure that going back to 1952 is really relevant in measuring the current function of primaries, since the political conventions still had much more influence on deciding a final candidate up through at least 1968 (as your example of Humphrey illustrates).