Presidential Elections in the United States: A Primer (CRS Report for Congress)
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| Release Date |
April 17, 2000 |
| Report Number |
RL30527 |
| Report Type |
Report |
| Authors |
Kevin J. Coleman, Joseph E. Cantor, and Thomas H. Neale, Government and Finance Division |
| Source Agency |
Congressional Research Service |
Summary:
Every four years, Americans elect a President and Vice President, thereby choosing both national
leaders and a course of public policy. The system that governs the election of the President
combines constitutional and statutory requirements, rules of the national and state political parties,
political traditions, and contemporary developments and practices.
As initially prescribed by the Constitution, the election of the President was left to electors
chosen by the states. Final authority for selecting the President still rests with the electoral college,
which comprises electors from each state equal in number to the state's total representation in the
House and Senate. All but two states award electoral votes on a winner-take-all basis to the
candidate with a plurality of the state's popular vote.
The process of electing the President is essentially divided into four stages: (1) the
prenomination phase, in which candidates compete in state primary elections and caucuses for
delegates to the national party conventions; (2) the national conventions--held in the summer of the
election year--in which the two major parties nominate candidates for President and Vice President
and ratify a platform of the parties' policy positions and goals; (3) the general election campaign, in
which the major party nominees, as well as any minor party or independent contenders, compete for
votes from the entire electorate, culminating in the popular vote on election day in November; and
(4) the electoral college phase, in which the President and Vice President are officially elected.
Presidential elections in recent years differ in several important respects from those held earlier
in American history. The first is the far wider participation of voters today in determining who the
party nominees will be; the political parties have in recent years given a much greater role to party
voters in the states (in lieu of party leaders) in determining the nominees. The second difference
involves the role of the electronic media and, most recently, the Internet, both in conveying
information to the voters, and shaping the course of the campaign. Third, the financing of
presidential campaigns is substantially governed by a system of public funding in the
pre-nomination, convention, and general election phases, enacted in the 1970s in response to
increasing campaign costs in an electronic age and the concomitant fundraising pressures on
candidates. Thus, contemporary presidential elections blend both traditional aspects of law and
practice and contemporary aspects of a larger, more complex, and more technologically advanced
society.
