A convention history as the GOP picks John McCain and Sarah Palin

Now, it's the Republican Party's turn for hoopla, this week in St. Paul. Allright, subdued hoopla. First, a little history for Ticket readers who think they know what GOP stands for.

Hint: It's not Grand Old Party.

It's Gallant Old Party, according to contemporary publications referring to the party that was launched in 1854 and only six years later captured the White House. Its candidate: a little-known fellow named Abraham Lincoln and an even lesser-known vice presidential partner named Hannibal Hamlin, who happened also to be a former Democrat who fled his old party because of its stubborn support of slavery.

Our blogging brethren over at CQ.com have generously posted a fascinating brief history of political party conventions, which we share below here on the day the Republican National Convention officially opens, sort of.

The proceedings will be perfunctory because of the approaching hurricane down south.

For a long time in our nation's history, these quadrennial conventions actually made decisions instead of making merry. Guess why they changed. (See answer below.)

It looks like a lock on the nomination for Arizona Sen. John McCain. Thank goodness we won't all go through what the Denver Democratic get-together did in 1924 in New York. That one lasted 16 days and 103 ballots to pick someone we've all come to know and love through the years, John W. Davis.

-- Andrew Malcolm

(The answer: TV.)

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Comments

[Peter]

I would like to see McCain out there in the storm surge in a rain slicker like the weather men do. LOL That would show his dedication to the American People. The question is how will Palin McCain 08 handle Gustav? Good thing Gustav came, news hasnt talked about the Palin trooper scandal at all http://www.veeppeek.com

[dave]

(gop - greedy old psychopaths?)
then maybe it's time to take back the republican party
by those that care about the republic, their rights and their constitution.
and how about you wait till the delegates have decided?
how is it journalism to vote in their place?
and what tells you they'll put their wallets above their conscience and their country this time around?
especially since RON PAUL will win even by default.

[Mark Conlan]

Andrew Malcolm's "answer" to his own question is wrong. Genuinely contested conventions continued to occur well into the TV era — the Democrats' last one was in 1972 and the Republicans' in 1976. What actually changed was the proliferation of primary elections after the fiasco of 1968 (in which Hubert Humphrey won the Democratic nomination without participating in ANY of the 14 primaries that year, and narrowly lost the election), which meant that in most cases one candidate in each party arrives at the convention already having enough pledged delegates from primaries and caucuses to clinch the nomination.

[captbilly]

You know I've been turning the Palin pregnancy story over and over in my head and it just doesn't add up. McCain claims to be all about straight talk but he neglected to tell America that the VP's daughter was pregnant. If she were married and 24 I am sure they would have felt that it wasn't a private family matter, and would have proudly told America that Palin was going to be a grandmother. But more to the point, McCain couldn't have possibly believed that this story wasn't going to come out pretty soon, so why didn't he say anything? The only answer I can come up with is that McCain didn't know, in spite of claims to the contrary, that Palin's daughter was pregnant. Of course he can't admit now that he didn't know because that would show that he hadn't done his job in vetting Palin.

But how is it possible that McCain didn't know about the pregnancy, because Palin didn't know either. That's the only answer that makes sense. Palin's daughter hadn't told her and Palin is so wrapped up in Being govenor of AK, having a Down's syndrom baby of her own, and running for VP that it was easy ofr her daughter to keep it from Palin. I think that behind closed doors there is a John McCain thowing things at his staff, and saying how could nobody have noticed this? The answer is probably that due to the extreme secrecy that McCain wanted to maintain about his VP picks, very few people even knew to be looking at Palin, even on McCain's own staff.

Even the story about the daughter planning to marry the boy doesn't wash. If she was planning to marry the boy then why not get on with it, do they think it will be better or easier to have the marriage in a few months. Perhaps a wedding at the maternity ward would be good? They got to the boy after they figured out the daughter was pregnant (a couple of days ago) and made him a deal. They don't want anyone to know who the father is yet because they don't yet know if they can trust him to back up their story. Nobody in Washington seriously believes that the pregnancy of an 17 year old unmarried daughter to the VP is considered private, and nobody in Washington would have believed that the story could have been contained.