Tantamount to election
"Tantamount to election" is a phrase in the United States to describe a situation in which one political party so dominates the demographics of a voting district, that the person winning the party nomination for a race (whether by primary or another method) will virtually be assured of winning the general election.[1] The phrase "safe seat" is commonly used to describe such a district.
The phrase originated in the American Solid South when and where the Republican Party was so weak or nonexistent that the general elections were mere formalities, the election having effectively been decided within the Democratic Party.[2]
The phrase "tantamount to election" may, nonetheless, be employed to describe an electoral situation in an overwhelmingly Republican area where candidates of the Democratic Party (or vice versa) are up against very steep odds.[3] It can refer to any electoral constituency in which dominance by one party renders candidates of other parties irrelevant. Notable Democratic examples (current and former) include such areas as Chicago, the "Solid South", New Orleans (from Huey Long onwards), Detroit, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Los Angeles, Washington D.C., Hawaii, and much of New Jersey, as well as gerrymandered districts in other states. Republican examples (current and former) include Nassau County, New York, Orange County, California, New Hampshire, Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, and Alaska.[4]
References
- ^ Political scientist Larry Sabato, e.g., uses the phrase "tantamount to election" in describing how "not a single Virginia Democrat nominated for statewide office in the primary was defeated in the general election for more than threescore years after the primary’s inception in 1905" (Sabato, quoted by Kenneth R. Plum, The changing of power in the Commonwealth, Reston Connection, 2003 April 30 [accessed 2009 December 28]).
- ^ Jackson Baker, Jamieson, only GOP hopeful, out of race for 89, Memphis Flyer Newsweekly (Contemporary Media, Inc.), 2003 November 6 (accessed 2009 December 28). See also White primaries.
- ^ An early instance was James A. Garfield's election to the U.S. House of Representatives from a district so Republican that the Republican nomination was considered "tantamount to election" (quoted from the Garfield biosketch on the Ohio Supreme Court site)
- ^ The phrase "tantamount to election" appears in scores of Wikipedia articles. A few examples: Solid South, ticket, Democrat Robert S. Calvert, Republican Pete Hoekstra. See also Larry Sabato, The Democratic Party Primary in Virginia: Tantamount to Election No Longer (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1977); ISBN 0-8139-0726-8; ISBN 978-0-8139-0726-0