Political Party Central Committees: What are they good for?
I first got involved in local Democratic party politics back in 2002. I had never volunteered for a campaign, met many candidates or officeholders, or understood much about how the whole process worked. But that year, Jean Carnahan lost her Senate seat to Jim Talent, and I could not really understand why. Talent’s margin of victory was slim and I couldn’t understand how the Democrats had failed to muster the extra 25K votes needed to win. I decided that I needed to find out where the local Democrats hung out and see if I could help them.
So together with a friend of mine, I headed off to my first Muleskinners meeting. There I met Charlie Christy, chair of the local Democratic Central Committee. He presented us both with membership applications to Muleskinners. The application also had a checkbox and dues amount for joining the local “Central Committee.” So we wrote our checks, filled out the forms and “joined” the Central Committee as well. What the heck, in for a penny, in for a pound.
After a few more meetings, Charlie explained more to me about the Central Committee: that there was a man and a woman elected from each county township or city ward by the voters during the August primary. That this was the same for the Republicans, Libertarians, and any other political party (I think the Greens had enough support that they had their own Central Committee in Boone County at the time). So, I started to attend the Central Committee meetings on Thursday nights, and after each one I’d receive another lesson or two from Charlie while leaning against the bed of his little pickup truck. (If you want to know more about the formal organization of Central Committees, its all at the Secretary of State’s web site. )
A carpenter by trade, Charlie had seen a lot of changes in the local and state party over the years. Both had grown old together. In theory, every central committee has a certain amount of power both within the party and in the public arena as well. For the public at large, they are theoretically responsible for nominating candidates for filling offices or ballot positions, when certain offices or ballot positions become vacated at very specific times. The Governor makes the official appointment.
Charlie told me about one time that happened. In 1996 (I think, not sure of the year), Chris Kelly had won the August primary for his re-election to the Missouri General Assembly. He was then appointed to the Labor and Industrial Relations board by Governor Mel Carnahan and there was an empty place for a democratic candidate for the 23rd district (might have been a different district number, like I said, I didn’t keep up much until 2002). So the Central Committee held interviews, reviewed applications and sent the committee’s recommendation to appoint Tim Harlan to be the democratic candidate. He went on to serve and do a great job until he was term limited out of the office.
But what didn’t appear in the paper, was the phone conversation between Charlie and the governor’s office, in which he was told to use whatever method seemed fair to make the decision, but the Governor would “expect to receive the recommendation to appoint Tim Harlan by such and such date.”
Now this story might be apocryphal (like fish stories, political stories tend to get bigger and better with age), but it has been very clear in recent years that the power to appoint lies with the Governor and the Governor will appoint whomever he or she chooses regardless of the actions of the local Central Committee. Recently, the Governor has not waited for the local committee to even meet.
And I don’t blame him. It is on the Governor if the appointee fails to do their duty in office and I wouldn’t trust these local committees to be able to discern between who is best qualified vs. who is their friend. The involvement of Central Committees in the process is an anachronism that dates back to the heyday of political bosses.
Internal to the party, the local Central Committees perform some perfunctory roles, such as nominating people to be on the state committee (sort of, it is a long process also involving legislative and senatorial committees), nominating people to attend political conventions, etc. Back in Charlie’s time (and when I was later on the central committee in 2004), the Central Committees were also a vehicle for funneling donations to candidates, in large part to avoid the campaign finance rules that were in place at the time. That was another source of power for them or at least funds and interest from local candidates. Changes to the ethics rules subsequently allowed unlimited campaign contributions, stripping the Committees of those functions.
[If you go back 50–60 years in Missouri History, there was a time when Democratic Central Committee men (there were almost all men then, there was no gender parity), held a lot of power. If you wanted to get a job in Government, you had to get their blessing. And if you had a government job, you would often pay a “lug fee” to the local Central Committee (2% 1% of your paycheck). They decided who would run for office, who would be the local judge, etc. Many were also racist $(@&#)%@*s. ]
Frankly, one of the hardest parts of serving as the Chair of the local party in 2008 was being the mediator between the members of the committee. When not united against the Republicans or other parties, there always seemed to be infighting. And some of the people who are willing to phone bank, stuff envelopes, and go door-to-door for candidates are also people with a lot of passion, which doesn’t always create a welcoming atmosphere for “Newbies.”
Regardless of the local in-fighting or conflicts of the moment, Central Committees need to realize that the intrinsic power that they once had is gone and is not coming back. They are a bunch of folks meeting in a room. Knowing that, they can either:
- Be content with their lot in life. Have long, relatively unproductive meetings, but ones that allow everyone to pontificate to their hearts delight and be happy. Perhaps serve some nice cookies and scones from time to time. Or ice cream during the summer! Perform the duties of a Central Committee well: help get delegates to conventions, etc. Leave the voter outreach to the pros.
- Create their own power through organizing, changing the rules, and trying new strategies. But that involves risk, not doing things like they have always been done, failing from time to time, and probably very little ice cream. This is the only way to remain relevant going forward and to breath new life into the organization.
I imagine that neither will happen fully. The inertia of the status quo is too much to overcome. Perhaps a change one way or the other will come in 100 years when there are all new people.
However, there is nothing wrong with option one. There are plenty of great candidates to support and help (that is where I am spending my energy, especially with the ones who have ice cream socials!), and folks can get involved with campaigns if they want to do more than help with inner party mechanics.
Option two would involve a large amount of organizing and effort. When I served as chair and vice-chair for the committee, we did a lot of organizing, helping candidates with mundane tasks and special requests. We had an excellent executive director to keep it all on track (two actually, Mark B and Brian G). Two extraordinary volunteers (Jeff and Vicki, current owners of progressive political partners) did most of the organizing work. And the chair at the time, Phyllis Fugit, worked basically full time+ to get all the miscellaneous done, deal with candidates, and keep the peace. It took me ~20 hours a week when campaigns were in full swing to help with the technology, signs and facilities at the coordinated campaign and local offices.
Frankly, it is way too much work for a very little pay off. There are simply better ways to organize volunteers for political purposes. And with Missouri status as a swing state waning–which energizes a lot of volunteers during presidential election years–and with state-wide candidates often more keen on running their own show instead of a coordinated effort, it is even a bigger job today.
Also consider that taxpayers pay to print the ballots to elect central committee members (in Missouri, the race need only be presented on the ballot if there are two or more candidates). State Political Parties should be able to organize on their own or figure out some way to do what they need done without central committees.
Central Committees don’t really perform any real public function or have much intrinsic influence: they don’t have the true power to appoint replacement, control who gets to work in government, or raise significant amounts of money on their own. Perhaps it would be better for the parties to get rid of them and move all organizational efforts to the state level.
What do you think, comment below?
If you liked this post, please click the heart below so that more folks will have a chance to see it.
