What do the DNC folk do?

Some of you have asked what the DNC does, how it works, and how to get on it. This discussion will be a bit dry, but hopefully useful for the student of our Party (and I am certainly continually trying to learn myself). This is a rough idea and may have some errors for which I apologize in advance.

The formal status of the DNC is set out in Article 3 of the Charter of the Democratic Party of the United States (“DPUS”) and Article 2 of the Bylaws of DPUS which may be found at http://a9.g.akamai.net/7/9/8082/v001/democratic1.download.akamai.com/808... .

In theory, the DNC has a lot of authority – but then so does the State Executive Committee of the NCDP and the Executive Committee of the County Party.

A quick analysis of the Charter, though, shows how the power is really structured. The 413 DNC Members are elected as follows:

• 200 Elected Members (plus enough extra to enable each State to have at least two DNC members in addition to their Chair and 1st VC).
• 112 DNC Members are the Chairs and 1st Vice Chairs of the various States and Territories plus a few for Democrats Abroad, etc. (Jerry Meek and Dannie Montgomery are our current Chair and 1st VC – I started on the DNC as 1st VC under Barbara Allen – Chair and 1st VC are mandated to be of the opposite gender).
• 75 DNC Members are chosen directly by the Chair (hard to get an at-large appointment from the floor – Chair’s nominations are carefully selected from the larger States, major figures in the Party, etc.)(NC’s Joyce Brayboy is an At-Large appointment).
• 33 or so DNC members from various Democratic organizations (Susan Burgess, the Mayor pro tem from Charlotte is a DNC Member by virtue of her office with the National Democratic Municipal Officials Conference).
• Add 3 Governors, 2 Congressmen, and 2 Senators
• 9 DNC Officers

That adds up to 434 – there are 3 more due to the requirement that the very small States have at least a Chair, Vice Chair and 2 Members – the total DNC Members is thus 437.

The 200 elected Members are allocated according to Presidential vote, plus other factors. Although NC is in the top 10 States in the population, we only get 5 Elected DNC Members – here are the big states:

Population
Rank State DNC Members
1 California 19
2 Texas 10
3 New York 12
4 Florida 10
5 Illinois 8
6 Pennsylvania 8
7 Ohio 7
8 Michigan 6
9 North Carolina 5

The total for the top 8 States is 80; then comes NC with 5. The remaining States split the other 117 Members.

Article III of the Charter and the Article II of the Bylaws set out the duties of the DNC. Those duties include calling the National Convention, filling vacancies for the President or VP nominees (remember Thomas Eagleton in 1972 – replaced with Sargent Shriver – the father of Maria Shriver and brother-in-law of JFK, RFK and Teddy Kennedy - as McGovern’s running mate), publishing a code of fair campaign practices, promoting and encouraging Party activities at every level assisting state and local Parties in electing Democrats, and issuing Party policies.

Because DNC members are volunteers (although quite a few are government employees, vendors, consultants and other related professions – they are still volunteers when it comes to DNC activities), the DNC staff, under the direction of the DNC Chair carries out most of the functions.

Howard Dean’s 50 State Strategy has, for the first time, put DNC staff and dollars into Southern States. Howard Dean, to his credit, has understood that by putting resources in States like NC, the DNC can help elect Democrats to Congress.

There is still, though, a bias against funding Congressional Candidates – we have seen Larry Kissell fall short (like Mike Taylor before him) in the 8th because of the refusal of the DCCC (which is a joint effort of Democrats in Congress and the DNC). It will be important for DNC Members with ties and contacts on the DCCC and the DNC leadership (now infused with the Obama team’s energy and outlook – and Obama wants NC to be in play).

As an example, several of our experienced DNC Members tried to hinge their support on promises of the candidates personally to campaign in NC after Labor Day and to keep NC in play. For example, I told the Obama delegate chasers and Sen. Obama early on that I would be much more inclined to declare for Obama if he would put NC in play.

While I certainly do not claim any particular credit for getting Sen. Obama to start his campaign is virtual nominee in NC, I do tend to think that the push by DNC Members to have the Obama campaign believe that NC was and is winnable made some impact to supplement Obama’s remarkable performance in the NC Primary.

Because it is hard to have a coherent conversation among 437 people, the States break into regional caucuses – Midwest, Eastern, Western, and Southern. Our caucus, the Southern caucus, is made up of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, West Virginia, Democrats Abroad (1/2 vote).

The Southern Caucus, including NC, has been fairly aggressive in recent years in trying to get the DNC to actually have and fund a meaningful ”Southern Strategy” (something other than waving hello while flying over the South to Florida).

Several of my DNC friends in Florida and I and others in the South tried, without success, to tell Howard Dean prior to the enacting of the Rules that stripped Florida (and later Michigan) of her delegates that the GOP controlled Florida legislature was the culprit in Florida and that the Florida State Democratic Party should not lose all of its delegates, and the campaigning of the Democrats during the Primary just because of the actions of the GOP.

We were, however, successful in keeping some of the proposed premium of delegates for having primaries after certain dates. While that was a bit of a victory, the Rules made it difficult to gain much advantage (see http://s3.amazonaws.com/apache.3cdn.net/f4225987fd9e438ef7_fqm6bev2k.pdf for the Call provisions). I proposed that if the Rules allowed for a 30% premium for those States that held (regardless of whether they changed their date to a later date) Primaries or Caucuses after 4/1/08, then the South would do well to move all of its Primaries or Caucuses to on or after 4/1/08 and dominate the process. Had we done that, Sen. Obama would likely have been the nominee by the evening of Tuesday April 1 (perhaps we should have waited until April 8 for PR purposes!).

Personal obligations of DNC Members include attending the meetings. Article II, Section 8 states that any DNC missing 3 consecutive meetings shall be deemed to have resigned their post - proxies do not count as attendance for such purpose. The meetings are held in various places around the country. Howard Dean has averaged 4 per year – 2 in DC and the others elsewhere. The expense of room, board and transportation runs in excess of $5,000 annually.

Although some State parties help their DNC Members with expenses, NC has traditionally only paid for the Chair’s expenses – the extra 4 meetings of the ASDC (Association of State Democratic Chairs – made up of the Chairs and the First VC’s of each State) during the three years I served on that body and attended every meeting doubled those expenses.

So why do it? It is a fascinating experience – the Super-Delegate uproar will probably not happen again for another 20 years (I suspect that the impact of SD’s will be cut back in the next cycle’s Rules), but there is enough to do without that.

The DNC Members are automatically delegates to the following National Convention (the terms start at the end of one Convention and run until the beginning of the next – DNC members elected at the 6/22 SEC Meeting will not have votes at the 2008 Convention, but will at the 2012 Convention – if they don’t miss 3 consecutive meetings).

The last 2 cycles have seen the Primary candidates address the DNC Meeting held in the Spring of the year before the cycle. It is a good opportunity to meet the candidates and see what they are like. As an example, Sen. Clinton was very difficult to chat with at that event – she was surrounded by staff and security. Sen. Obama, on the other hand, was extremely approachable and easy to talk with – which may have helped him as the campaign went along since he was the least known of the major candidates.

The Rules & Bylaws Committees are made up of DNC Members. Platform, though, is a Convention activity and is made up of elected folk from the States – you do not have to be a Delegate to get on one of the Committees (Rules, Credentials and Platform) for the Convention. It is, in fact, a great way to get in the Hall and is how I got to go to the Atlanta Convention in 1988.

DNC Membership is also a good way to learn about what other States are doing – particularly in the Regional breakouts. Some National Chairs have encouraged breakout sessions (Terry McAuliffe did that some as did Don Fowler of SC), but the DNC Meetings are mostly affirmations of the Chair’s decisions.

I hope this helps folks understand what the DNC does and how it works a little bit. I have certainly enjoyed it and that is why I am running again. I believe that I can help our NC candidates get the attention and resources that they need to win – and I believe that Larry Kissell, Dan Johnson and Kay Hagan can all win with those resources and strong grassroots campaigns to maximize those resources.

I will post this, if possible, to my website www.voteparker.com as soon as I can – I realized that it has a lot of ideas from when I was exploring running for State Party Chair in 2004 and am trying to fix it. Please bear with me.

David Parker