First, the February 10 Democratic primary is what is known as a "binding" primary. This means that Virginia delegates to the National Convention, where the Presidential Candidate will be picked, must proportionally represent the candidate vote totals on February 10. But how do those vote totals turn into warm bodies in Boston in July? It's a long involved process that, to the uninitiated, appears Byzantine, Rube Goldbergian, and perhaps even nefarious. In reality, it's logical, fair, and not new; it is, however, complex and just a wee bit hard to follow. Here's an attempt to simplify it -- and give some pointers to those who want to be delegates.

Let's start with some terms:

Primary - Is what we all get to vote in. "All" means all registered voters, regardless of whether you're a Democrat, Republican, independent, or whatever. Virginia's primary is open to all comers.
Caucus - This is an event that is held in April at the city or county level. Any registered voter can come and participate in it. It's free -- but you do have to sign a Democratic pledge saying that you consider yourself a Democrat and that you do not intend to support anyone opposed to the Democratic nominee. (For you oldsters, this thing used to be called a "mass meeting.") The purpose? To select delegates to the District and State Conventions.
Convention - There are two of them - a Congressional District Convention in May and a State Convention in June. Only delegates (and their alternates) get to attend these. The purpose? To elect delegates to the National Convention in July and to conduct other party business.
Delegate - There are two types of these. One type is a district/state delegate (elected at the caucus). If you get elected one of these, then you get to go to both the congressional district convention and the state convention. The other type is a national delegate. You can get elected one of these at the district convention (the easiest route to the big dance) or at the state convention.
Pre-filing - What you have to do if you want to be a delegate. It's simply filling out a form saying that you want to be a delegate. It must be completed and turned in 5 days in advance of the caucus (if you want to be a delegate to the congressional district and state convention) or 15 days in advance of the district or state convention (if you want to be a delegate to the national convention). There's a voluntary fee (between 10 and 25 bucks) for doing this, but if you can't pay, you don't have to.
Viability - This term has to do with whether a presidential candidate got enough Primary votes to deserve delegates to the various conventions. There are three levels at which viability is statistically determined - the locality, the congressional district, and the state. So a candidate may be viable at one but not the others.

And now some dates:

February 10 Primary Day
April 17 or 19 The day for the city or county caucus. Local party leaders get to pick their day.
May 8, 15, or 22 The day for the Congressional District Caucus. District leaders get to pick their day.
June 5 State Democratic Convention at the Hotel Roanoke
July 26 National Democratic Convention in Boston

And now for some statistics:

Number of Charlottesville delegates to be elected to district and state conventions = 14
Number of Albemarle delegates to be elected to district and state conventions = 27
Number of Fluvanna delegates to be elected to district and state conventions = 6
Number of Greene delegates to be elected to district and state conventions = 3
Number of Nelson delegates to be elected to district and state conventions = 5
Number of delegates to National Convention to be elected at 5th District Convention = 5
Number of delegates to National Convention to be elected at State Convention = 29
Total number of Virginia delegates to National Convention = 96

And finally, a little bit about how this all happens:

Let's say, for example, that you are an Albemarle County voter who wants to participate in the process. The County Democratic Committee will announce the date for their caucus well in advance (it will be either noon on Saturday, April 17 or 7:00 pm on Monday, April 19). All you've got to do is show up at the caucus site, sign the Democratic pledge, sign that you are a registered County voter, and you're in! No telling how many people will be there. It might be 30; it might be 300. Numbers don't count so much here, but more on this later. Once everyone's signed in, the caucus will start. People wanting to vote for Clark delegates will go to one room (or corner thereof), those voting for Dean delegates to another room, etc. Go to the room of the candidate you want to caucus with.

Q. What if I voted for one candidate on Primary Day but now I want to vote for my neighbor who's running as a delegate for another candidate?

A. No problem. How you voted on Primary Day is your secret. What group you want to "caucus with" is up to you.

So now you're in your room with a bunch of other caucusers. You will have been told in advance how many delegates you get to select.

Q. How are the number of delegates per candidate determined?

A. That's why we had the primary! Albemarle's 27 delegates are allocated to each presidential candidate proportional to the Albemarle vote on Primary Day. So let's say Presidential Candidate John Doe received 30% of the primary votes in the County. He gets 8 County delegates. And let's say Jane Smith gets 20% of the primary vote. She gets 5 delegates. And let's say Joe Blow gets 10%. He gets….no delegates. Why? Because he is not "viable" in Albemarle County in that he didn't get 15% of the primary vote. (However, he would be viable and get delegates from Charlottesville City, where he got 17% of the primary vote.)

Q. And what if I want to support Joe Blow and vote for delegates for him?

A. Too bad. You've got to go into somebody else's caucus room or go home.

So now you've gone into John Doe's caucus room and you're ready to elect delegates. You get to vote for 8 people. They will be pre-printed on a ballot because their names are known. How? Because they had to prefile. They each had to turn in a form to the County Democratic officers at least 5 days in advance saying they wanted to run for delegate.

Q. Can I run to be a delegate for John Doe, even if I voted in the primary for Joe Blow? How about if I didn't even vote in the primary?

A. Sure on both questions. But you may find that getting elected is fairly hard unless you were a known supporter of John Doe. There's no place in this process for uncommitteds, and being a party regular doesn't get you much either -- unless you've been out working for your presidential candidate. It's only natural that most of those people who go into the John Doe caucus are activists for John Doe and are going to vote for their fellow activists.

So, back to the process. All those folks who prefiled as John Doe delegates will be on the John Doe ballot and, if that's the group you decided to caucus with, you and the others in the group get to vote for your favorite 8. Those 8 with the most votes get to be delegates - to both the congressional district and the state convention. (It's important to remember that winning election in your caucus gets you a ticket to both conventions.) Alternates are also elected, but let's skip that for now.

Next comes the congressional district convention. Only those people who were elected delegates or alternates from the various localities in the district get to attend. So if you were elected a delegate from the Charlottesville-Albemarle area, you get to go to the 5th district convention to be held in May. Using our "John Doe" example again, you and all the other John Doe delegates will get together at this convention and, if John Doe is viable at the district level (that is, if he had enough primary votes in the 5th District to win one or more national convention delegates), then your caucus will elect one or more John Doe delegates to the national convention.

If you want to run for national delegate at this level, you have to prefile 15 days before the district convention. Warning: winning election here is not easy. For one, John Doe or his representative has the right to not accept you as a potential delegate (he gets to vet the list of prefiled delegate candidates before the convention). Also, there are only five delegates that will be elected at this level. And that's for all the presidential candidates. So, unless John Doe really cleaned up in the 5th District, he'll probably only get one or two delegates. Finally, the Party's affirmative action plan requires that half of all delegates be women. To make this work, there's a formula for allotting delegates by sex. The 5th District gets 3 males and two females, and the formula determines which candidate(s) get which sex. So, if John Doe gets only one delegate at this level, and it has to be a woman and you're a guy, you're out of luck. A word to the wise: If you want to get elected a national delegate at this level, you better start lobbying all the other John Doe delegates in the 5th District to vote for you. You should be able to get a list of them from the John Doe campaign or from the state party.

Q. What if I'm elected a district/state delegate for John Doe but he's not viable at the district level?

A. Then you'll have to go vote in some other candidate's caucus at the district convention or, if you're not willing to do that, go home. If you want to run for national delegate, you would have to prefile as a delegate for a presidential candidate who is viable. But the chances of getting elected this way are slim to none.

So now you've survived the district convention and it's on to the state convention in June. Here, you get to vote again for some more national delegates. The biggest chunk is 18 "at-large" delegates that are divvied up according to the proportional statewide vote for the presidential candidates. Once again, if you're a John Doe delegate you caucus with the rest of the John Doe delegates and elect a few more national delegates. And once again, you yourself can run by prefiling with the state party 15 days in advance and surviving John Doe's vetting process. It's not easy here either, because John Doe may only have 4 or 5 delegates to select here and people from all over the state are voting on them. But go ahead - throw your hat in the ring and campaign for it!

At the state convention, you will also get to vote on a certain number of party officials who want to go to the national convention as John Doe delegates (altogether between all the presidential campaigns, there are 11 of these to elect). And finally, there are 14 unpledged (they don't have to say who they are for) party leaders, like the Governor, who are automatic national delegates. When you add it all up, there are 96 delegates to go to Boston from Virginia.

There will also be some other party business (as well as some party parties) to tend to at the state convention - like election of Democratic National Committee members, among others.

Well, that's it in a nutshell. If this kind of stuff turns you on, you can read more about it, including the 85-page down-to-the-last-iota version, on the state party's website: www.vademocrats.org. And if you have questions, you can call Ruth Ann Walker at the state party at 804-644-1966 or Jim Heilman locally at 293-3514. (Jim Heilman, January 21, 2004)