Why is it assumed that this process must be directly and absolutely democratic? We’ve come a long way from smoke-filled rooms, but you wouldn’t know it from some of the complaining I’ve heard, first about caucuses and now about superdelegates. To me it makes sense the DNC members and members of Congress have their own seats at convention, just as DSC members and legislators are automatic delegates to our state conventions. This is simply a method of checks and balances to allow both activists and regular voters to gave a say.
Both Clinton and Obama have their share of superdelegates who have publicly endorsed them. Even if all superdelegates were with one candidate it would not be enough to overturn a clear voter mandate. In the case of Senators who are superdelegates, they are also colleagues of both and frankly probably do have more, or at least different, insight than the rest of us as to who would be a good President. Keep in mind that the members of Congress and Governors are themselves elected by the people and DNC members are elected by the DSCs who are elected by the people. These people should be prepared to explain their votes, but they should vote their consciences.
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p>…define the problem and does not justify it. It is supposed to be a system of representational government where we voters have the say and from hanging chad’s to caucus’s dominated by party activists to (GOP) winner take all vs. proportional (Dem’s but still 20% of the delegates are super delegates not beholden to the will of the voters who elected them in deciding who gets elected) to the electoral college itself the system is broken and needs fixing not justifying why the broken pieces somehow add up to it working.
The superdelegates are a legacy of the back room dealing that characterized the Democratic Party for much of its existence. They are part of the same tragic political family as indirect elections of Senators and the President (as originally drafted in our Constitution) and laws that prevented women and various minorities from voting in the past (and indeed at present, in some cases). All of these rules give an edge to unelected insiders at the expense of regular voters. What’s the point of having caucuses and primaries if in the end the insiders make the call.
And people more familiar with the history or who lived through it can please correct me if I’m factually inaccurate.
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p>In 1968, a year of tumult by any standard, President Johnson stepped out of the race for his re-election very suddenly, and after the New Hampshire primary. This allowed Hubert Humphrey to set himself up as the establishment candidate at the convention, even though he did not participate in a good deal of the campaign. Humphrey lost that election for a whole host of reasons, but one thing was clear: the party needed a more open and perhaps more democratic way of picking our candidate.
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p>So before the election of 1972, Democrats adopted some major reforms of the McGovern-Fraser commission including:
But who did we get? We got a really, really horrible candidate who also lost for a plethora of reasons. This yielded another series of reforms, which is where super-delegates come in.
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p>The superdelegates were designed to be 20% of the delegation who are party leaders (read: establishment). This gives the establishment the opportunity to block a populist, far left candidate who might do well in primary races, but not well in the general election. In other words, the whole reason for their existence is to be inherently undemocratic–to thwart the will of the people who show up at primaries and caucuses and actually vote.
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p>Now, we can have different philosophies about whether this is a good or a bad thing, but DFA’s claim that, “if super-delegates don’t like who you choose to be our nominee, they can overturn your vote,” may be entirely accurate, especially in a very, very, very close election like the one we’re having today.
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p>You raise a very interesting question:
And the answer is simple. Because most people view a fair system with the one that is most closely associated as a maximally democratic system. You may disagree, but I think we can agree that most people, certainly most Democrats, hold that opinion. And if you view, as I do, justice as essentially fairness (see: Rawls), then the most democratic system is the must just system, and I hope we’re all working for a just system. Why is a more democratic system more fair and just? Because it gives more people a say in the process and it’s more open.
The whole McGovern-Fraser Commission part matches my understanding. It is also my understanding that superdelegates were added in part to remove them from the equation of elected delegates. If we did not give them automatic seats many would seek elected seats. With their inherently better connections those who sought seats would probably get them and thus diminish even further the ability of the rank and file to participate. True, there is definitely philosophical difference here. While I am a Democrat (capital D) in terms of public policy, I tend to be a republican (small r) when it comes to governing philosophy. Finally you say, “This gives the establishment the opportunity to block a populist, far left candidate who might do well in primary races, but not well in the general election.” Isn’t that precisely the point? A far-left dream candidate will be absolutely worthless if s/he can’t win the general anyway.
In 2008, I think it’s safe to say, though, that the super-delegates aren’t functioning in that role. They’re not acting as goalies to reign in a progressive choice (and it seems we disagree about whether they should even do that), since both candidates are remarkably close on most important issues — though I prefer Obama in part because of his stance on open government and his opposition to the war in Iraq.
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p>If the point of a super-delegate is to simply tend to the middle, then it’s not clear to me that they should have the immense power that they potentially wield should the race be as close as is projected.
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p>A note also about your “small r governing policy”: we’re not governing here, or even electing to govern here. We’re electing a candidate to compete in a general election who will then govern (we hope). I don’t really see why representation/smaller choice of decision-makers would be a better system than a maximal egalitarian system, other than the “reigning in the left,” argument which as I said simply isn’t relevant to this case.
It’s a combination of voters and party officials, both of which deserve a say in the process. I agree they are not necessarily reigning in the extreme in this case. As to the philosophy I meant governing any kind of institution including a party, not just public government.
And I think the DFA is off-base here as well. What vote is there to “overturn” anyway? The race is still basically a tie (which may change in the next few days/weeks, but right now it’s essentially a tie) nearly any way you cut it. Both camps knew the rules going in, and so they knew that a certain number of the delegates they might need to get to 2025 were superdelegates. So I don’t see the “overturn the vote” argument here.
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p>It’s also worth remembering that the United States is the only country with such an extensive primary system (indeed, most have no primary system whatsoever). So clearly democracy does not require primaries at all, yet we do — and the superdelegates are only a minor check on the system. So the claim that our primary system is not democratic seems crazy to me, when one considers the comparative perspective.