The Republican National Convention (RNC) is a series of presidential nominating conventions held every four years since 1856 by the Republican Party in the United States. They are administered by the Republican National Committee. It is also known as the Republic National Convention by noted reliable television journalist Marc Berman. [1] The goal of the Republican National Convention is to officially nominate and confirm a candidate for president and vice president, adopt a comprehensive party platform and unify the party, as well as publicize and launch the fall campaign.
Delegates from all fifty U.S. states and from American dependencies and territories, including Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, attend the convention and cast their votes. Like the Democratic National Convention, the Republican National Convention marks the formal end of the primary election period and the start of the general election season. In 2020, all parties replaced the usual conventions with short online programs.
The Republican Party was formally organized on a national basis at a meeting in Lafayette Hall in Pittsburgh on February 22–23, 1856, during which the first Republican National Committee was elected.
The first Republican National Convention was the 1856 Republican National Convention, held from June 17 to 19, 1856, at Musical Fund Hall at 808 Locust Street in Philadelphia. At the 1856 Republican National Convention, the party nominated John C. Frémont, a U.S. Senator from California for president and William L. Dayton, a former U.S. Senator from New Jersey for vice president.
The 1864 event, with the American Civil War raging, was branded as the "National Union Convention" since it included Democrats who remained loyal to the Union and nominated Andrew Johnson, who had been elected Governor of Tennessee as a Democrat, for vice president. By 1868 the usual Republican name was restored. [2]
The 1912 Republican National Convention saw the business-oriented faction supporting William Howard Taft turn back a challenge from former President Theodore Roosevelt, who boasted broader popular support and even won a primary in Taft's home state of Ohio. Roosevelt would run on the Progressive Party ticket, splitting the Republicans and thereby handing the election to Democrat Woodrow Wilson. The 1924 Republican National Convention made history by being the first GOP convention to give women equal representation. This was the first time the Republican Convention was held in Cleveland, Ohio. It was also the first time any convention was broadcast over radio – to nine cities through a special link over long-distance telephone lines. [3] The Republican National Committee approved a rule providing for a national committee-man and a national committee-woman from each state. Incumbent President Calvin Coolidge was formally nominated and went on to win the general election. The convention nominated Illinois Governor Frank Lowden for vice president on the second ballot, but he declined the nomination. This is the only time a nominee refused to accept a vice presidential nomination.
The Republicans returned to the city in 1936 in the cavernous Cleveland Public Auditorium. Former President Herbert Hoover addressed the delegates on the second day of the convention. On the third, Alf Landon of Kansas (who did not attend) was nominated for president; Colonel Frank Knox was nominated as the vice presidential candidate. [4] Landon and Knox were defeated in a landslide by Franklin D. Roosevelt and John Nance Garner. Knox subsequently served as Secretary of the Navy in the administration of Roosevelt. The 1940 Republican National Convention was the first national convention of any party broadcast on live television. It was carried by an early version of the NBC Television Network and consisted of flagship W2XBS (now WNBC) in New York City, W3XE (now KYW-TV) in Philadelphia and W2XB (now WRGB) in Schenectady and Albany.
The growing importance of primaries became evident at the 1964 Republican National Convention in San Francisco, where U.S. Senator Barry Goldwater from Arizona won the nomination, easily turning away Pennsylvania governor William Scranton and others more favorable to the party establishment.
At the 1972 Republican National Convention, Pat Nixon became the first First Lady since Eleanor Roosevelt and the first Republican First Lady to deliver an address to the convention delegates. [5] It is now common practice for the presidential candidate's spouse to deliver an address to the delegates. Also in 1972, the placing of "favorite son" candidates' names into nomination was banned, requiring at least five states' requests to do so. In recent years, only one candidate's name has been put into nomination, and challengers have been put under intense pressure to withdraw in order for the vote to be unanimous.
An exception was when former California Governor Ronald Reagan nearly toppled incumbent President Gerald Ford at the 1976 Republican National Convention in Kansas City. Ford was in office for only two years before he was challenged by Reagan, who was a fellow Republican. Reagan was on record saying that fellow Republicans should never talk badly about one another, but Reagan's view had since changed, but the power of incumbency was too much for Reagan to overcome. This was the last GOP convention where the outcome of the nomination was in doubt. After the Republican National Convention, the pressure was on Ford to cut away the factionalism in his Republican Party.
Pat Buchanan delivered a speech enthusiastically endorsing the conservative side of the culture war in American society at the 1992 Republican National Convention in Houston. It was widely criticized for supposedly alienating liberal and moderate voters who might otherwise have voted for the moderate nominee and then-incumbent President George H. W. Bush. Division in the party was evident too at the 1996 Republican National Convention, at which more moderate party members such as California governor Pete Wilson and Massachusetts governor William Weld unsuccessfully sought to remove the Human Life Amendment plank from the party platform. The event at the San Diego Convention Center remains the last Republican National Convention to be held in a convention center complex; all others since then have been held at sports stadiums or arenas.
The Republican Party chose Cleveland again as the site for the 2016 Republican National Convention. The convention was held in Quicken Loans Arena, home of the Cleveland Cavaliers. There may have been political considerations in the selection, since no Republican has won the presidency without winning Ohio since Abraham Lincoln in the 1860 election. Cuyahoga County has voted 19 times for Republicans and 21 times for the Democratic candidate since 1856. However, the Democrats had carried the county for the past 40 years. [6]
The party chose Charlotte, North Carolina as the location for its 2020 Republican National Convention, but pulled out at the last minute. President Donald Trump announced the convention would be moved to Jacksonville, Florida, but subsequently cancelled the Jacksonville convention plans amidst COVID-19 pandemic concerns and complications on July 23. The convention proceedings were then held remotely from various locations, with the final day taking place on the South Lawn of the White House.
The party's presidential nominee is chosen primarily by pledged delegates, which are in turn selected through a series of individual state caucuses and primary elections. The size of delegations to the Republican National Convention, for each state, territory, or other political subdivision, are described by Rule 14 of the party's national rules. [7] The party does not use superdelegates as does the Democratic Party, and all delegates are pledged to a candidate in some fashion.
The Republican Party's rules leave discretion to the states in choosing how to award their respective pledged delegates to the candidates. Some states may use a statewide winner-take-all method, where the primary candidate who receives the most popular votes in a state gets all of its pledged delegates. Other states may use a proportional representation system, where the pledged delegates are instead distributed to the candidates in proportion to its votes. [8] [9]
Three leaders of each state, territory, and Washington D.C.'s Republican Party (its national committeeman, its national committeewoman and its chairperson) are automatically nominated as pledged delegates to the national convention. [7]
Since 2012, the number of pledged delegates initially allocated to each of the 50 U.S. states is: Ten at-large delegates, plus three district delegates for each of the state's congressional districts. [7] [10] As each state has at least one congressional district, the minimum number of delegates from this allocation for any state is 13.
Jurisdictions with non-voting congressmembers are instead given a fixed amount of pledged at-large delegates. In 2020, American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, and the U.S. Virgin Islands each get six at-large delegates; Puerto Rico receives 20; and Washington, D.C., gets 16. [7]
The Republican Party awards bonus pledged delegates to each jurisdiction based on two main factors (where applicable): whether its electoral college votes went to the Republican candidate in the last presidential election, and on how well the state party has done in electing Republicans to state and congressional elections. [7]
The bonus delegates thus reward states that vote for Republican candidates and punish those which do not. As examples, for the 2020 Convention using California and Texas (the two most populous states, California being a Democrat stronghold and Texas a Republican one):
The candidate nomination process at the convention is governed by Rule 40 of the party's national rules. Under Rule 40(b), a candidate must have the support of a majority of the delegates of at least five delegations in order to get the 2020 nomination. [7]
The 1832 United States presidential election was the 12th quadrennial presidential election, held from Friday, November 2 to Wednesday, December 5, 1832. Incumbent president Andrew Jackson, candidate of the Democratic Party, defeated Henry Clay, candidate of the National Republican Party.
The 1852 United States presidential election was the 17th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 2, 1852. Democrat Franklin Pierce defeated Whig nominee General Winfield Scott. A third party candidate from the Free Soil party, John P. Hale, also ran and came in third place, but got no electoral votes.
The 1856 United States presidential election was the 18th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 4, 1856. In a three-way election, Democrat James Buchanan defeated Republican nominee John C. Frémont and Know Nothing nominee Millard Fillmore. The main issue was the expansion of slavery as facilitated by the Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854. Buchanan defeated President Franklin Pierce at the 1856 Democratic National Convention for the nomination. Pierce had become widely unpopular in the North because of his support for the pro-slavery faction in the ongoing civil war in territorial Kansas, and Buchanan, a former Secretary of State, had avoided the divisive debates over the Kansas–Nebraska Act by being in Europe as the Ambassador to the United Kingdom.
The 1860 United States presidential election was the 19th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 6, 1860. In a four-way contest, the Republican Party ticket of Abraham Lincoln and Hannibal Hamlin won a national popular plurality, a popular majority in the North where states already had abolished slavery, and a national electoral majority comprising only Northern electoral votes. Lincoln's election thus served as the main catalyst of the states that would become the Confederacy seceding from the Union. This marked the first time that a Republican was elected president. It was also the first presidential election in which both major party candidates were registered in the same home state; the others have been in 1904, 1920, 1940, 1944, and 2016.
The 1884 United States presidential election was the 25th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 4, 1884. In the election, Governor Grover Cleveland of New York defeated Republican James G. Blaine of Maine. It was set apart by unpleasant mudslinging and shameful personal allegations that eclipsed substantive issues, such as civil administration change. Cleveland was the first Democrat elected president of the United States since James Buchanan in 1856, the first to hold office since Andrew Johnson left the White House in 1869, and the last to hold office until Woodrow Wilson, who began his first term in 1913. For this reason, 1884 is a significant election in U.S. political history, marking an interruption in the era when Republicans largely controlled the presidency between Reconstruction and the Great Depression.
The 1892 United States presidential election was the 27th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 8, 1892. In the fourth rematch in American history, the Democratic nominee, former president Grover Cleveland, defeated the Republican incumbent, President Benjamin Harrison. Cleveland's victory made him the first and, to date, the only person in American history to be elected to a non-consecutive second presidential term. It was also the first of two occasions that incumbents were defeated in consecutive elections—the second being Gerald Ford's loss to Jimmy Carter in 1976, followed by Carter's loss to Ronald Reagan in 1980.
The 1904 United States presidential election was the 30th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 8, 1904. Incumbent Republican President Theodore Roosevelt defeated the conservative Democratic nominee, Alton B. Parker. Roosevelt's victory made him the first president who ascended to the presidency upon the death of his predecessor to win a full term in his own right. This was also the second presidential election in which both major party candidates were registered in the same home state; the others have been in 1860, 1920, 1940, 1944, and 2016.
The 1908 United States presidential election was the 31st quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 3, 1908. Republican Party nominee William Howard Taft defeated three-time Democratic nominee William Jennings Bryan.
The 1932 United States presidential election was the 37th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 8, 1932. The election took place against the backdrop of the Great Depression. The incumbent Republican President Herbert Hoover was defeated in a landslide by Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt, the governor of New York and the vice presidential nominee of the 1920 presidential election. Roosevelt was the first Democrat in 80 years to simultaneously win an outright majority of the electoral college and popular vote, a feat last accomplished by Franklin Pierce in 1852, as well as the first Democrat in 56 years to win a majority of the popular vote, which was last achieved by Samuel J. Tilden in 1876. Roosevelt was the last sitting governor to be elected president until Bill Clinton in 1992. Hoover became the first incumbent president to lose an election to another term since William Howard Taft in 1912, and the last to do so until Gerald Ford lost 44 years later. The election marked the effective end of the Fourth Party System, which had been dominated by Republicans. It was the first time since 1916 that a Democrat was elected president.
Each of the 50 U.S. states, the District of Columbia, and territories of the United States holds either primary elections or caucuses to help nominate individual candidates for president of the United States. This process is designed to choose the candidates that will represent their political parties in the general election.
The Democratic National Convention (DNC) is a series of presidential nominating conventions held every four years since 1832 by the United States Democratic Party. They have been administered by the Democratic National Committee since the 1852 national convention. The primary goal of the Democratic National Convention is to officially nominate a candidate for president and vice president, adopt a comprehensive party platform, and unify the party. Pledged delegates from all fifty U.S. states, the District of Columbia, and the American territories, and superdelegates which are unpledged delegates representing the Democratic establishment, attend the convention and cast their votes to choose the party's presidential candidate. Like the Republican National Convention, the Democratic National Convention marks the formal end of the primary election period and the start of the general election season. Since the 1980s, national conventions have become mostly inaugural events for the winning candidate, since winners are announced long before the convention. In 2020, both major parties, and many minor parties, replaced their usual in-person conventions with virtual programs due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
In American politics, a superdelegate is a delegate to a presidential nominating convention who is seated automatically.
A United States presidential nominating convention is a political convention held every four years in the United States by most of the political parties who will be fielding nominees in the upcoming U.S. presidential election. The formal purpose of such a convention is to select the party's nominee for popular election as President, as well as to adopt a statement of party principles and goals known as the party platform and adopt the rules for the party's activities, including the presidential nominating process for the next election cycle.
The 1860 Democratic National Conventions were a series of presidential nominating conventions held to nominate the Democratic Party's candidates for president and vice president in the 1860 election.
The 1856 Republican National Convention was a presidential nominating convention that met from June 17 to June 19, 1856, at Musical Fund Hall at 808 Locust Street in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was the first national nominating convention of the Republican Party, founded two years earlier in 1854. It was held to nominate the party's candidates for president and vice president in the 1856 election. The convention selected John C. Frémont, a former United States Senator from California, for president, and former Senator William L. Dayton of New Jersey for vice president. The convention also appointed members of the newly established Republican National Committee.
The 2008 Iowa Democratic presidential caucus occurred on January 3, and was the state caucuses of the Iowa Democratic Party. It was the first election for the Democrats of the 2008 presidential election. Also referred to as "the First in the Nation Caucus," it was the first election of the primary season on both the Democratic and Republican sides. Of the eight major Democratic presidential candidates, then-U.S. Senator Barack Obama of Illinois received the most votes and was ultimately declared the winner of the Iowa Democratic Caucus of 2008, making him the first African American to win the caucus and the first African American to win a primary state since Jesse Jackson in 1988. Former U.S. Senator John Edwards of North Carolina came in second place and then-U.S. Senator Hillary Clinton of New York finished third, though Clinton received more delegates than Edwards. Campaigning had begun as early as two years before the event.
A brokered convention, in US politics, can occur during a presidential election when a political party fails to choose a nominee on the first round of delegate voting at the party's nominating convention.
From March 12 to June 27, 1940, voters of the Democratic Party elected delegates to the 1940 Democratic National Convention through a series of primaries, caucuses, and conventions. Incumbent President Franklin D. Roosevelt was selected as the party's presidential nominee despite not formally declaring a campaign for a third term. Supporters effectively drafted Roosevelt, who was non-committal about seeking re-election, amid rising concerns over war in Europe.