Gop Official: Give Clout To State Party

State conventions for Idaho Republicans and Democrats still are more than a year away, but one North Idaho political leader would like to see some big changes.

Paul Rechnitzer of Sagle says the conventions have been reduced to a pile of useless formalities. The former Bonner County Republican chairman suggests a return to the system of allowing state conventions to pick the major candidates.

“I really believe that would make it worthwhile,” Rechnitzer says. “We might have somebody who was not handpicked by somebody in southern Idaho.”

Rechnitzer, who is retired, was county chairman for 12 years; for the last eight years, he has been a precinct committeeman. He also is treasurer for the county GOP.

He said that when he has gone to a state convention, he has been amazed at the time delegates spend on resolutions and platform planks, which are ignored once the convention ends.

“I couldn’t believe we were wasting so much time about nothing. They picked through that stuff like it was the Ten Commandments,” Rechnitzer said.

It’s that way on purpose. Political bosses like to engineer the platform and resolutions so they won’t hurt any candidate - and that usually turns into bland, meaningless statements.

Rechnitzer said conventions would mean more if candidates had to woo delegates and win votes to get on the ballot.

That also would help solve the “party purity” problem. “That’s the local problem. Every once in a while, somebody comes out of the woodwork, and they run as a Republican or a Democrat - and they are not,” Rechnitzer said.

In the 1960s, Idaho switched to an “open” convention to nominate candidates. But the system was dropped after just a couple of elections. Party leaders decided it would be better to allow the voting public to pick candidates and to get away from the perception that a few people were deciding who would run.

Secretary of State Pete Cenarrusa, the state’s top election official, said he always has favored “open” state conventions because “it really gives precinct committeemen and the state parties much more to do in picking candidates.”

The old system produced one of the great stories of Idaho politics. At the 1964 GOP state convention, George Hansen of Pocatello wasn’t favored by many delegates but was so persistent that he finally got just enough support to get on the ballot.

He surprised everybody by winning the primary and then captured the 2nd District congressional seat thatyear and six other times.

Rechnitzer also said he would like to see an end to the 5-month lag between the Idaho primary and general elections. He says that’s hard on workers at the county level - the people major candidates expect to do all the work.

Idaho’s primary was moved to late May in the 1970s in an attempt to lure presidential candidates to the state. But it hasn’t worked, and the state has been stuck with the long campaign season ever since.

Lawmakers have discussed moving the primary to late August or September, but county clerks oppose it. They have to prepare budgets by Oct. 1 and don’t want to have their two major responsibilities falling at the same time.

Cenarrusa said Republicans would have problems with a later primary that occurs after the national nominating conventions because the primary now determines allocation of national delegates among the party’s presidential contenders. Democrats would have no such problem because their delegates are selected at caucuses early in the year.

Rechnitzer admits the media would have a field day talking about “the smoke-filled rooms and fat political bosses” making decisions, but he says a lively state political convention would generate enthusiasm and perhaps get more people interested in the political process.

“I don’t know the right answer,” he said, “but what we have is not the answer.”