Jewett on brokered conventions.
There are still 17 state primaries and more than three months to go before Republicans convene in Cleveland to nominate their 2016 presidential candidate, but party leaders already have been preparing for the possibility that no contender will arrive with the delegates he needs to secure the nomination. In an email interview, we asked University of Central Florida political scientist Aubrey Jewett for some details on how a contested convention works, and some historical perspective. A longer version of the interview is at OrlandoSentinel .com/opinion.
Q: There’s already talk of a contested or “brokered” Republican convention this year. What triggers one? A: If no candidate secures the majority of delegates before a party convention starts there is a contested convention. If after the first round of voting no candidate has achieved a majority of delegates there is a brokered convention. This year a Republican candidate must get at least 1,237 delegates to secure the nomination and the Democratic candidate must get 2,382. The term “brokered convention” describes the wheeling and dealing that occurs as candidates seek to attract a majority of delegates on subsequent ballots.
Q: How many years has it been since the last brokered convention, and why doesn’t it happen more often? A: It has been 30 to 40 years since the last contested conventions (GOP 1976 and Democrats 1984) and over 60 years since the last brokered convention (Republicans 1948 and Democrats 1952). They happen infrequently for three reasons: First, one candidate usually emerges and becomes the front-runner, which causes many voters to “jump on the bandwagon” to support the perceived winner. Second, pressure is often put on poorly performing candidates to drop out for the sake of party unity. Third, since the 1950s, each party has adopted rules to make brokered conventions less likely.
Q: How does the party select a nominee under these circumstances? A: The most likely scenario would be that if the first round of voting did not produce a winner, then the delegates would be released from their pledges to support a particular candidate and could vote for whomever they liked. This would result in additional rounds of balloting until one candidate achieves a majority (the record was set at the 1924 Democratic Convention; it took 15 days and 103 rounds of balloting to select a nominee).
Q: Is it possible for a failed presidential candidate, or even an undeclared candidate, to be chosen as the nominee? A: While unlikely, it is possible and has happened in the past. At the 1924 Democratic convention, delegates eventually selected a compromise candidate after the two leading candidates withdrew after the 102nd ballot. If neither Donald Trump nor Ted Cruz win on the first ballot, than additional candidates could be nominated and be eligible for votes.
Q: Donald Trump has warned of riots if he’s not nominated. Has there been violence at other brokered conventions? A: There has been violence at a number of national party conventions and often it has been associated with a brokered convention. In 1860, the Democratic convention broke apart over slavery resulting in a second convention at which Northern Democrats nominated Stephen Douglas and Southern Democrats chose John Breckinridge. In the 1924 Democratic convention, violence broke out when a large contingent of Ku Klux Klan members attended as delegates and the party split between two factions: Southern native white pro-segregation and northern immigrant pro-civil rights.