{
  "id": "RL30527",
  "type": "CRS Report",
  "typeId": "REPORTS",
  "number": "RL30527",
  "active": false,
  "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
  "versions": [
    {
      "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
      "id": 101908,
      "date": "2000-04-17",
      "retrieved": "2016-05-24T20:37:10.410941",
      "title": "Presidential Elections in the United States: A Primer",
      "summary": "Every four years, Americans elect a President and Vice President, thereby choosing both national\nleaders and a course of public policy. The system that governs the election of the President\ncombines constitutional and statutory requirements, rules of the national and state political parties,\npolitical traditions, and contemporary developments and practices.\n  As initially prescribed by the Constitution, the election of the President was left to electors\nchosen by the states. Final authority for selecting the President still rests with the electoral college,\nwhich comprises electors from each state equal in number to the state's total representation in the\nHouse and Senate. All but two states award electoral votes on a winner-take-all basis to the\ncandidate with a plurality of the state's popular vote.\n  The process of electing the President is essentially divided into four stages: (1) the\nprenomination phase, in which candidates compete in state primary elections and caucuses for\ndelegates to the national party conventions; (2) the national conventions--held in the summer of the\nelection year--in which the two major parties nominate candidates for President and Vice President\nand ratify a platform of the parties' policy positions and goals; (3) the general election campaign, in\nwhich the major party nominees, as well as any minor party or independent contenders, compete for\nvotes from the entire electorate, culminating in the popular vote on election day in November; and\n(4) the electoral college phase, in which the President and Vice President are officially elected.\n  Presidential elections in recent years differ in several important respects from those held earlier\nin American history. The first is the far wider participation of voters today in determining who the\nparty nominees will be; the political parties have in recent years given a much greater role to party\nvoters in the states (in lieu of party leaders) in determining the nominees. The second difference\ninvolves the role of the electronic media and, most recently, the Internet, both in conveying\ninformation to the voters, and shaping the course of the campaign. Third, the financing of\npresidential campaigns is substantially governed by a system of public funding in the\npre-nomination, convention, and general election phases, enacted in the 1970s in response to\nincreasing campaign costs in an electronic age and the concomitant fundraising pressures on\ncandidates. Thus, contemporary presidential elections blend both traditional aspects of law and\npractice and contemporary aspects of a larger, more complex, and more technologically advanced\nsociety.",
      "type": "CRS Report",
      "typeId": "REPORTS",
      "active": false,
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          "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/pdf/RL30527",
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      "topics": []
    }
  ],
  "topics": [
    "American Law",
    "Constitutional Questions"
  ]
}