by David Hornestay

Created on: August 04, 2011   Last Updated: August 05, 2011

The major political parties choose their Presidential candidates in open nominating conventions in which most of the delegates are pledged to an aspirant for the nomination as the result of a state primary election. The party candidate is selected by a majority vote of the delegates assembled after a party platform has been adopted and nominating speeches have been heard. 

Although Presidential nominations by parties were not contemplated by the Constitution, they were being made as soon as George Washington let it be known that his second term would be his final term. Vice President John Adams was the nominee of the Federalist Party in 1796, and former Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson got the nod of what became the Democratic Party, but was then called the Republican Party.

According to ThisNation.com, Presidential candidates of the major parties were chosen by Congressional caucuses until 1832. Andrew Jackson, seeking reelection that year, wanted to provide a more public setting for his selection of Martin VanBuren as his Vice President and adopted the idea of a nominating convention from a long-forgotten minor party. From that point on, the nominating convention became the standard practice for both parties.

Throughout the 19th century however, convention delegations remained under the control of state party leaders. Primary elections, in which voters were given the opportunity to vote for party candidates, were introduced sparingly early in the 20th century. Former President Theodore Roosevelt, seeking to unseat his Republican successor, William Howard Taft, won nine of ten primaries available in 1912. However, since the vast majority of delegates was still being chosen by party bosses, Taft got the nomination. TR proceeded to form a third party and outpolled Taft in the general election, but both lost to Democrat Woodrow Wilson.

However, the undemocratic result of the Republican convention led more states to intoduce primaries, although many were popularity polls without legal effect on delegate selection. Nevertheless, the results began to exert pressure on party leaders, and by 1952, when Dwight Eisenhower did better in the primaries than party favorite Robert Taft, the Republican Old Guard reluctantly went along with Ike. For the Democrats, John F. Kennedy was the first to win nomination on the strength of primary success in 1960. 

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