How America Nominated Its Presidential Candidates

Elaine K. Mark: For most of American history, the nomination process was basically a semi-public process or private process that took place within the political parties. Back then, the parties generally used caucuses, which were meetings of party insiders who would select delegates to eventually go to the National Convention. Most of the time in primaries, you had what were called favorite sons. The other use for the primaries was for candidates to show party leaders they were electable.