An Inside Look at How the Iowa Democratic Caucuses Work

It's a little more than 24 hours before the Iowa caucuses are scheduled to be gaveled to order and I'm listening with disbelief as a reporter from the BBC tries to characterize the "mood of voters" here in my home state and explain the whole caucus process in less than 45 seconds. Will Democrats go with Hillary, Obama or Edwards (like there are only three to choose from)? Who will actually show up for the caucuses and what issues will be on their minds? After two years of perpetual campaigning, relentless media coverage and endless phone calls from campaign volunteers and news and academic surveyors, and a rain forest's worth of junk mail overflowing our recycle bins, are we Iowans feeling just a bit burned out -- maybe even kind of cynical?

My name is Jerald Thomas Hawhee (call me Jerry). I am a professional composer and a native and lifelong citizen of Iowa. I attended my first Democratic caucus in January of 1976 when I was 17, going on 18, and supported Oklahoma Sen. Fred Harris (remember him?). I've served on Democratic central committees in two Iowa counties, have been a precinct captain for the general election in both urban and rural precincts, volunteered for the campaigns of Al Gore, Howard Dean, John Kerry and, this year, John Edwards (as precinct captain). This year marks the second time I'll also be officiating as chairperson for my local precinct caucus in the tiny village of Cantril in Van Buren County in the extremely rural southeast corner of the state. I'm here to give you an insider's view of the caucuses, tell you a little about how they're set up and run, and explain why all the horserace-obsessed polling in the media is meaningless. I hope in the process you'll come away with an appreciation for this amazing exercise in grass-roots representative democracy, and why we Iowans take our responsibility to the rest of the nation so seriously.

Actually, my official title is "temporary caucus chair" and I was appointed to it by the local party (county) chairman. I may not get to keep my title for very long since the "permanent chair" is elected by the attendees at the caucus. This is usually just a pro forma thing, but the system is set up to be as democratic, open and transparent as possible at all stages of the process. If my caucus does elect someone else to be permanent chair, I am still obligated to assist the new chairperson, since I've had the training and understand the mechanics of the system.

The caucus is about the most basic one on one form of grass-roots democracy you can possibly imagine. In my little town, mostly populated by Amish and Mennonites who don't vote as a rule, those of us who do vote tend to be a bit reticent about politics in public; this may be due to a kind of reserved upper-Midwest-Garrison-Keilor-esque sort of mind-set, the knowledge that you have to live very close to these other people all year round, and politics is one of those things that just tends to rile people up. But once every four years, when we step into the caucus room, it's actually OK to talk politics, stand up publicly and proudly in support of our chosen candidates, and offer and debate resolutions about the issues that concern us.

The basic purpose of the precinct-level caucus is to set up the local organizational machinery for the election season to come. Let's face it, you could nominate the greatest candidate who ever lived but without good organization, you will LOSE! We hope enough willing and committed folks show up so we can elect them to serve on the various committees (central, platform, committee on committees). It's these folks who go on to serve as precinct captains in the general election, hammer out the local party platform and keep the whole weird contraption called a "party" running smoothly with everybody communicating properly. If that's all we did, nobody would pay the slightest attention to us, but we also just happen to elect delegates to the county Democratic convention who may go on to the district, state and national gatherings, and because each delegate is committed to a candidate (though some uncommitted delegates may also be elected) the media smells a horserace!