The Iowa caucus will help decide the 2012 GOP race for the presidential nominee. A week later, the primary election for New Hampshire is Jan. 10, one week after Iowans make their choice.
Here is some background information regarding the New Hampshire primary election.
History
The History Channel states New Hampshire first held a presidential primary in 1952. Primaries for choosing presidents often didn't come into popular use until the 1970s in the United States. New Hampshire was one of the first states to implement such an election for choosing presidents of the United States.
New Hampshire's official almanac states the first victor in the New Hampshire primary was Dwight D. Eisenhower. The former general was so popular, he never once campaigned in the state and won on reputation alone. He was elected president after Harry S. Truman left office.
Richard M. Nixon holds the records for most victories in the New Hampshire primary. From 1960 to 1972, he won three contests. In the 1960 race, there were only 15 states that held presidential primary elections.
Results
Every incumbent president who has run unopposed in New Hampshire has won a second term in office, going back to Eisenhower in 1956. More recently, New Hampshire has played a bigger role in national politics. In 2000, Democratic vice president Al Gore won with nearly 76,900 votes. Sen. John McCain of Arizona won the Republican side with 115,600 votes in a seeming landslide over George W. Bush. Bush came back later in the primary season to become the nominee and win the general election.
McCain won again 2008 after coming in a distant fourth place in the Iowa caucus. The New York Times noted the Arizona Republican garnered just 15,559 votes in Iowa and then picked up nearly six times as many in New Hampshire. Despite an early loss in Iowa, McCain went on to become the GOP nominee.
Current State of Affairs
In the 2008 primary, there were nearly 234,000 votes cast for GOP candidates. The ballot for the New Hampshire primary has 30 names on it as opposed to just seven mainstream candidates. Herman Cain is still listed despite suspending his campaign. Many of the names on the ballot are not known on a national level such as Michael J. Meehan from St. Louis and Christopher V. Hill from Prospect, Ky.
The Boston Globe reports Mitt Romney still holds a sizable lead over his competition. Independent voters may be the key in the presidential primary. Romney holds a slim lead with undeclared voters in New Hampshire in recent polls conducted by the Globe.
As the political clock counts down to the New Hampshire presidential primary, the election is still anyone's to win.
William Browning is a research librarian specializing in U.S. politics. Born in St. Louis, Browning is active in local politics and served as a campaign volunteer for President Barack Obama and Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill.
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