Worcester Democrat and the ledger-enterprise. (Pocomoke City, Md.) 1921-1953, 1940-03-15
FALL ELECTIONS NOT 10
CONTAIN SIGNIFICANCE
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delegates who in most cases are not
pledged to vote for any particular
candidate at the national convention.
One of the important reasons why
the Presidential primary system is
weak can be seen in the tabulation of
states on this page. These states
about a third of the 48-represent
roughly about so per cent of the pop
ulation, and their voters will elect a
large percentage of the delegations
authorized to choose Presidential can
didates at the conventions next sum-
mer, Democrats voting in these states
for example, will elect about 444 out
of the some LOO delegates who will
decide the Democratic nominations,
and the Republicans in these states
will elect about 43O out of the 1000
or more who will decide the Republi-
can nomination.
But these delegations will not truly
reflect the Presidential preferences of
the voters electing them. Why?
Some of the more important answers
follows:
Cd In many of the states holding
Presidential primaries, the voters will
elect delegations filed for certain can
didates but not pledged to support the
candidates indefinitely. Indeed, even
though the elegations may be nomi-
nally pledged, they can act as they or
their leaders see fit. Thus, for exam
pie, in 1886 the Ohio Republican pri-
mary gave five delegates to Borah
and AZ to Taft, but on the first ballot
at the party's national convention, all
81 delegates voted for Landon.
(2) In some of the states listed in
the tabulation, voters will elect dele
cations filed for "favorite sons" By
political custom and etiquette, "fa-
vorite sons" are usually unopposed in
primary elections. Thus, Senator Taft
will probably have clear field in the
Forthcoming Ohio primary and Ohio
voters accordingly will have no
chance to express their true prefer
ences in relation to Taft, Dewey and
Vandenberg.
(3) In some of the Presidential pri-
mary states, stalking horse" will
run. A stalking horse" is kind of
"favorite son" whose functions is to
win a state delegation for some other
candidate who does not want to enter
his name in the primary. Thus, to
refer to Ohio again stalking horse"
will run for President Roosevelt, and
Democratic voters will not be able to
pass judgment on other candidates,
unless a man like Vice President Gar
ner should decide to enter the race.
az In many of these primary
states, the leading Presidential hope
fuls in both parties are unwilling to
run, for numerous and varying reas-
ons. Thus, neither Vandenberg nor
Taft are running against Dewey in
Illinois, and Illinois Republicans will
therefore have no way of expressing
their relative feelings, but will have
only Dewey to vote for. By the same
token-and much more significantly
from the third-term standpoint
Democratic hopefuls like McNutt,
Wheeler and Farley are not entering
the primary elections against delega-
tions filed for President Roosevelt.
Although he has neither affirmed nor
denied his candidacy, the President
has been placed in the race by those
who want him to run again, and Vice
President Garner is the only Demo-
crat who has thus far challenged this
procedure by becoming a candidate
himself.
In view of such facts as these, it
seems clear that the results of this
years Presidential primaries will
scarcely be representative of popular
opinion as regards the final choice of
candidates at both the Democratic
and Republican national conventions.
Plainly enough, popular Democratic
opinion has no way of expressing it
self in the primary elections when
most of those elections involve only
prof. Roosevelt delegations. Similarly,
popular opinion among the Republic
cans cannot express itself when the
chief G. o. P. contenders fail to run