- allocation: Electoral votes are allocated among the States based on the Census. Every State is allocated a number of votes equal to the number of Senators and Representatives in its U.S. Congressional delegation—two votes for its Senators in the U.S. Senate plus a number of votes equal to the number of its Congressional districts.
- chronic minority: voters who belong to political parties that tend not to be competitive in national elections because they are too small to become a majority or because of the Electoral College system distribution in their state
- conventions (caucuses):
A party convention is a meeting of delegates from a political party to select candidates for office and deciding the party's platform.
On a less formal level, conventions serve to get party delegates and members organized and excited for an upcoming election.
Conventions can take place at several levels, including local, state, or national. The most significant party conventions in the United States are the national conventions of the Republican and Democratic parties. Both conventions take place every four years during the summer before a presidential election.
National conventions have thousands of attendees who aren't involved in the official business at hand. These include activists, party officials, volunteers, local business leaders, and news media.
- county chair:
- - Important Dates for the Party Conventions, Primary Elections, and General Election.
- county or senatorial district convention:
- electoral competition model: politicians ”act solely in order to attain the income, prestige, and power which come from being in office. (...) Upon this reasoning rests the fundamental hypothesis of our model: parties formulate policies in order to win elections, rather than win elections in order to formulate policies”
- executive committee:
- grassroots organization: A grassroots movement is one that uses the people in a given district, region or community as the basis for a political or economic movement.[1] Grassroots movements and organizations use collective action from the local level to implement change at the local, regional, national, or international levels. Grassroots movements are associated with bottom-up, rather than top-down decision-making, and are sometimes considered more natural or spontaneous than more traditional power structures.
- party machines: a political machine is a party organization that recruits its members by the use of tangible incentives (such as money or political jobs) and that is characterized by a high degree of leadership control over member activity. The machine's power is based on the ability of the boss or group to get out the vote for their candidates on election day.
While these elements are common to most political parties and organizations, they are essential to political machines, which rely on hierarchy and rewards for political power, often enforced by a strong party whip structure. Machines sometimes have a political boss, typically rely on patronage, the spoils system, "behind-the-scenes" control, and longstanding political ties within the structure of a representative democracy. Machines typically are organized on a permanent basis instead of a single election or event.
- party platform: a formal set of principal goals which are supported by a political party or individual candidate, in order to appeal to the general public, for the ultimate purpose of garnering the general public's support and votes about complicated topics or issues. A component of a political platform is often called a plank – the opinions and viewpoints about an individual topic, as held by a party, person, or organization. The word plank depicts a component of an overall political platform, as a metaphorical reference to a basic stage made of boards or planks of wood. The metaphor can return to its literal origin when public speaking or debates are actually held upon a physical platform.
- patronage: Political patronage is the system of rewarding political allies with government jobs, especially prestigious positions which pay well and demand little in the way of work. Political patronage is sometimes also referred to as “spoils.”
The political patronage system is routinely denounced, but in fact the practice is probably as old as the US government itself. The Constitution gives the president the right to appoint judges and ambassadors, as well as members of the cabinet. (In many cases these positions also require approval by the Senate.)
- permanent party organizations: Organization of the parties themselves are often discussed in terms of the permanent organization of the party and the temporary (campaign) organization of the party (See Figure 9.9). In each election precinct, a precinct chair will be elected in the party primary. The precinct chair will head the precinct convention, in addition to serving on the party's county executive committee. In the primary, the county chair will also be elected. The county chair will lead the county executive committee, which is composed of the chair and precinct chairs. The main responsibility of the county executive committee is to run the county primary and plan the county conventions.
At the state level, there is a state executive committee, which includes a state chair and vice-chair. These officers are selected every two years at the state party conventions. The state executive committee:accepts filings by candidates for statewide office
helps raise funds for the party
and establishes party policy
- plank:
- political party: an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific ideological or policy goals.
- precinct chair:
- responsible party model: Responsible party government theory requires that voters hold parties electorally accountable for their performance in control of government.
- runoff primary:
- state party chair:
- straight-ticket voting: the practice of voting for every candidate that a political party has on a general election ballot. The term can also refer to a straight-ticket voting option, sometimes known as a master lever,[1] that allows voters to check a box and vote for all of a party's candidates, instead of voting for each race individually.
- temporary party organizations: The temporary organization of the party includes the precinct conventions. The main role of the precinct conventions is to select delegates to the county convention and to possibly submit resolutions that may eventually become part of the party platform. Delegates chosen at the precinct convention then go to the county conventions (or in urban areas, to district conventions). These conventions elect delegates to the state convention. Democratic and Republican parties hold state conventions every other year.
