Making California More Presidential : Move the state’s presidential primary to early March

With just two votes in the Legislature and the governor’s OK, California can tow the presidential primary campaigns out of the Ice Age. Go for it.

What is up for decision next week is whether to move California’s presidential primary to early March. The change would be important to California, because it might give it a chance to have something important to say about the next President. As things now stand, 85% of the delegates to nominating conventions already are committed to a candidate before California’s June primary.

It is important to the nation in every case where voters might interpret victories in the wintry campaigns of Iowa and New Hampshire as signs that the winners who are gaining strength are getting support from people like them. Voters in neither Ice-Age primary are typical of the rest of the nation. A Democrat who campaigns for a strong Pentagon, for example, has never stood a chance in Iowa.

Sacramento is haggling over details, but the quibbles seem far less important than the principle of letting California speak out earlier in the primary rounds. In this age of canny political managers and instant communications, parochial views should not be allowed to contribute to a well-heeled candidate’s effort to buy momentum, and California is well-suited to balance parochialism.

Its percentages of citizens who are black or Latino and of families living below the poverty line are far closer to the national average than either of the Ice-Age primary states. It has the largest state population and one of the most diverse.

Some opposition to the move deserves serious consideration. State Sen. Gary Hart (D-Santa Barbara) worries that in a state where so few eligible voters bother to go to the polls, money and media will carry the day and tilt the scale toward candidates with big war chests. But big media campaigns are important in California and other states no matter what dates elections are held. If the situation makes money more important than it should be, the problem should be dealt with directly. Another way to look at this concern is that many California voters sleep through elections, because they don’t think they can make a difference. An early presidential primary might make their vote mean more, motivating them to get to the polls.

There is also concern over the fact that voting falls off among Republicans when a GOP President is running unopposed for reelection, and--although not in recent memory--vice versa. State Sen. Ken Maddy (R-Fresno) worries that this could lead special interests to load the presidential primary ballot with initiatives that would be defeated in a more balanced turnout. If this seems a real problem, the Legislature can solve it by asking voters to approve a constitutional amendment to put presidential primaries in the same category as other special elections--and thus removed from the regular primary.

Before the votes in the Legislature take place, someone may well argue against smashing the ancient tradition of Ice-Age primaries, but there is no such thing. New Hampshire has been holding its primaries in March for as far back in this century as anybody keeps records. But Iowa, which technically has no primary but rather a series of party caucuses all over the state, did not push to the front of the calendar until 1972. What gave both states prominence was a sharp increase in the art of polling and media management combined with America’s natural interest in horse races, that being the way most electronic media presented the primary campaigns.

For California, and for the political process itself, the positives far outweigh the negatives. The Legislature should move ahead and Gov. George Deukmejian should make it law.