William_T._Bianco,_David_T._Canon]_American_Polit

The role of political parties in American politics 281

beginning in January of a presidential election year. The type of election (primary

or caucus) and its date are determined by state legislatures, although national party

committees can limit the allowable dates, using their control over seating delegates

at the party conventions to motivate compliance. Voters in these primaries and

caucuses don’t directly select the parties’ nominees. Instead, citizens’ votes are used

to determine how many of each candidate’s supporters become delegates to the

party’s national nominating convention, where delegates vote to choose the party’s

presidential and vice-presidential nominees. The national party organizations

determine how many delegates each state sends to the convention based on factors such

as state population, the number of votes the party’s candidate received in each state in

the last presidential election, and the number of House members and senators from the

party that each state elected (see How It Works: Nominating Presidential Candidates).

Campaign Assistance One of the most visible ways that the political parties support

candidates is by contributing to and spending money on campaign activities. By and

large, federal law mandates that these funds be spent by the organization that raised

them—the national party, for example, is limited in the amount of money it can directly

contribute to congressional and presidential candidates or to state party organizations.

As we will discuss in Chapter 10, however, party organizations can use the campaign

funds they raise to help candidates in other ways, for example, through independent

expenditures—running their own ads in a candidate’s district or state.

Figure 8.6 shows the amount of money raised by the top groups within the

Republican and Democratic parties for the 2018 election (through October 30). The

final figures show that the parties and their various committees raised over a billion

dollars. The DNC and RNC raised the most money, but the congressional campaign

committees also raised significant sums. Congressional Democratic committees

nominating convention

A meeting held by each party every

four years at which states’ delegates

select the party’s presidential and

vice-presidential nominees and

approve the party platform.

$0 $50 $100 $150 $200 $250 $300 $350 $400 $450

Total receipts (in millions)

Democratic Congressional

Campaign Committee

Democratic Senatorial

Campaign Committee

Democratic Leadership

PACs

Democratic National

Committee

Republican Leadership

PACs

National Republican

Senatorial Committee

National Republican

Congressional Committee

Republican National

Committee

FIGURE

8.6

Democratic

and Republican

Fund-Raising

in the 2017–2018

Election Cycle

In the 2017–2018 election cycle,

party and leadership committees

raised more than one billion dollars

in campaign funds. Although most of

this money was raised by the national

committees, the state, local, and

candidate committees also raised

significant sums. To what extent

might these funds allow the national

committees to force candidates to run

on the party platform?

Source: The Center for Responsive Politics,

http://www.opensecrets.org (accessed 10/30/18).

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