Posted on 09/19/2007 7:04:19 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
Legislation to create regional presidential primaries won praise at a Senate Rules and Administration Committee hearing for aiming to fix an “arms race” of states striving to be first.
But critics argued that regions wouldn’t do any better job than the current free-for-all, and warned a constitutional amendment might be necessary.
Sens. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn.; Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn.; and Joseph I. Lieberman, I-Conn.; sponsored the bill (S 1905) to create four regions taking turns with primaries in early March, April, May and June in 2012. The order would be determined by lottery and then rotated in future cycles.
The Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary would remain separate as the first of the country.
“Our presidential primary system is broken and it’s time to stop the primary arms race,” Klobuchar said.
The concern that sparked the legislation grew when 26 states scheduled primaries or caucuses on Feb. 5. Florida moved its primary to Jan. 29 and Michigan passed legislation to move to Jan. 15.
The fear is that as New Hampshire edges up from a tentative date of Jan. 22, Iowa could move into 2007 in a chaotic scenario that hurts campaigns from making long-term plans.
“It is clear that these issues that create so much uncertainty need to be corrected prior to the next presidential cycle by the parties or by the Congress,” said Michael Mauro, the Iowa secretary of state and co-chairman of the National Association of Secretaries of State.
Richard L. Hasen, a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, argued that the bill was unlikely to violate the First Amendment rights of the parties because the bill is directed at the states.
But William G. Mayer, associate professor of political science at Northeastern University, said the bill might be unconstitutional because it’s unclear whether the federal government can tell states what to do, or whether any government can control activities of the parties.
Mayer also argued that regional contests might not solve the problem because candidates who are strong in a particular region would enjoy “significant advantage.”
The Democratic and Republican national committees opposed the legislation in testimony submitted to the panel. The DNC argued that the parties establish rules for delegates to their nominating conventions and that Congress lacks the authority to impose a particular system.
Even in committee reaction was mixed.
Chairman Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., co-sponsored the legislation to avoid the scramble that the race has become. But the ranking Republican, Sen. Robert F. Bennett of Utah, suggested a constitutional amendment might be needed.
Another committee member, Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, opposed any regional scheme. He argued regional systems would still be dominated by populous states, so he said the schedule should be divided by population centers.
Lieberman, who campaigned for president and as the Democratic nominee for vice president in 2000, disagreed a bit with his own bill. He suggested that Iowa and New Hampshire should be scheduled in their regions, rather than given special status at the head of the line, because the current system gives them disproportionate influence.
“It is clear this is a hot topic for debate,” Feinstein said.
This story originally appeared in CQ Today.
Why does it need to be that complicated? Just establish a fixed primary day like we have for election day.
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