"Explores one of the most important questions in American politics--how we narrow the list of presidential candidates every four years. Focuses on how presidential candidates have sought to alter the rules in their favor and how their failures and successes have led to even more change"--Provided by publisher.

New Hampshire is the subject of Palmer's book precisely because it serves as the first presidential primary every four years. Many critics of the New Hampshire primary fault it for being too arcane, too unrepresentative, and too quixotic to use as a gatekeeper of who becomes President. Palmer went to new Hampshire expecting to gather research that argued against New Hampshire as first primary. As he finished he realized his findings pointed out the opposite, that in fact and deed, New Hampshire was as good a place to start the primary races as any other. No single state is representative. The retail politics that aspirants face in New Hampshire is a very useful winnowing device in which a candidate must actually come face to face with real voters, who more often than not make a study of the issues and policies that they raise in their questions.

In the coming presidential primaries, no state is as important in setting the stage - or affecting the odds - as New Hampshire. This small, mountainous, proudly distinctive state holds the first primary and the results, both real and in comparison to expectations, can greatly influence the competition for the highest office in the land. Candidates who do well can create momentum and gain support, while those who do worse than expected can be counted out. Scala explains the distinctiveness of New Hampshire politics and how the candidates create strategies to appeal to the state's voters. New Hampshire's sympathy for reformist candidates has the paradoxical affect of jumpstarting the campaigns of those candidates least representative of Democratic voters nationally. The implications for Democratic chances to win the presidency in 2004 are discussed.

Black & white print. American Government 3e aligns with the topics and objectives of many government courses. Faculty involved in the project have endeavored to make government workings, issues, debates, and impacts meaningful and memorable to students while maintaining the conceptual coverage and rigor inherent in the subject. With this objective in mind, the content of this textbook has been developed and arranged to provide a logical progression from the fundamental principles of institutional design at the founding, to avenues of political participation, to thorough coverage of the political structures that constitute American government. The book builds upon what students have already learned and emphasizes connections between topics as well as between theory and applications. The goal of each section is to enable students not just to recognize concepts, but to work with them in ways that will be useful in later courses, future careers, and as engaged citizens. In order to help students understand the ways that government, society, and individuals interconnect, the revision includes more examples and details regarding the lived experiences of diverse groups and communities within the United States. The authors and reviewers sought to strike a balance between confronting the negative and harmful elements of American government, history, and current events, while demonstrating progress in overcoming them. In doing so, the approach seeks to provide instructors with ample opportunities to open discussions, extend and update concepts, and drive deeper engagement.

Contents: (1) Intro.; (2) Competing Approaches: Direct Popular Election v. Electoral College Reform; (3) Direct Popular Election: Pro and Con; (4) Electoral College Reform: Pro and Con; (5) Electoral College Amendments Proposed in the 111th Congress; (6) Contemporary Activity in the States; (7) 2004: Colorado Amendment 36; (8) 2007-2008: The Presidential Reform Act (California Counts); (9) 2006-Present: National Popular Vote -- Direct Popular Election Through an Interstate Compact; Origins; The Plan; National Popular Vote, Inc.; Action in the State Legislatures; States That Have Approved NPV; National Popular Vote; (10) Prospects for Change -- An Analysis; (11) State Action -- A Viable Reform Alternative?; (12) Concluding Observations.

This report describes the four stages of the presidential election process: the pre-nomination primaries and caucuses for selecting delegates to the national conventions; the national nominating conventions; the general election; and voting by members of the electoral college to choose the President and Vice President. The report will be updated again for the 2004 presidential election.

The 2008 U.S. presidential campaign has provided a lifetime's worth of surprises. Once again, however, the nomination process highlighted the importance of organization, political prowess, timing, and money. And once again, it raised many hackles. The Democratic contest in particular generated many complaints—for example, it started too early, it was too long, and Super Tuesday was overloaded. This timely book synthesizes new analysis by premier political scientists into a cohesive look at the presidential nomination process—the ways in which it is broken and how it might be fixed. The contributors to Reforming the Presidential Nomination Process address different facets of the selection process, starting with a brief history of how we got to this point. They analyze the importance—and perceived unfairness—of the earliest primaries and discuss what led to record turnouts in 2008. What roles do media coverage and public endorsements play? William Mayer explains the "superdelegate" phenomenon and the controversy surrounding it; James Gibson and Melanie Springer evaluate public perceptions of the current process as well as possible reforms. Larry Sabato (A More Perfect Constitution) calls for a new nomination system, installed via constitutional amendment, while Tom Mann of Brookings opines on calls for reform that arose in 2008 and Daniel Lowenstein examines the process by which reforms may be adopted—or blocked.

Administering Elections provides a digest of contemporary American election administration using a systems perspective. The authors provide insight into the interconnected nature of all components of elections administration, and sheds like on the potential consequences of reforms that fail to account for this.

Guide to the Presidency is the leading reference source on the persons who have occupied the White House and on the institution of the presidency itself. Readers turn to this guide for its vast array of factual information about the institution and the presidents, as well as for its analytical chapters that explain the structure and operations of the office and the president's relationship to co-equal branches of government, Congress and the Supreme Court. This new edition is updated to include: A new chapter on presidential power Coverage of the expansion of presidential power under President George W. Bush

If Barack Obama had not won in Iowa, most commentators believe that he would not have been able to go on to capture the Democratic nomination for president. Why Iowa? offers the definitive account of those early weeks of the campaign season: from how the Iowa caucuses work and what motivates the candidates’ campaigns, to participation and turnout, as well as the lingering effects that the campaigning had on Iowa voters. Demonstrating how “what happens in Iowa” truly reverberates throughout the country, five-time Iowa precinct caucus chair David P. Redlawsk and his coauthors take us on an inside tour of one of the most media-saturated and speculated-about campaign events in American politics. Considering whether a sequential primary system, in which early, smaller states such as Iowa and New Hampshire have such a tremendous impact is fair or beneficial to the country as a whole, the authors here demonstrate that not only is the impact warranted, but it also reveals a great deal about informational elements of the campaigns. Contrary to conventional wisdom, this sequential system does confer huge benefits on the nominating process while Iowa’s particularly well-designed caucus system—extensively explored here for the first time—brings candidates’ arguments, strengths, and weaknesses into the open and under the media’s lens.