A Law Unto Itself

I think that there is a significant misunderstanding in the works about how party conventions function when they are actually called upon to choose a national ticket.  Some of the commentary is treating this as nothing more than a Nate Silver-esque number crunching formula.  At the end of the caucuses and primaries, so this argument goes, each remaining candidate will have a certain number of pledged delegates.  This tally is something that can be tracked and assessed as you go along and we will know the final result.  Not necessarily true.

Consider that party conventions were conceived as the political equivalents of constitutional drafting or ratifying conventions--an irregular body that was the highest lawmaking authority.  Although this aspect of the party conventions has lain dormant for decades, dormant does not mean extinct.  As I pointed out in an earlier post, delegate credentials can be challenged, the voting rules can be changed,  certain candidates can be excluded from being placed in nomination, and the convention is the final authority on these matters (though the losers may try to sue afterwards).

Here's an example where this power might matter.  Suppose that one of the winner-take-all primaries (say in Florida or Ohio) results in a very close result that is subject to an election contest.  While state courts might weigh in on that dispute (depending on what the relevant state statutes say on election contests), the Republican National Convention can decide for itself who won.  Thus, we may end up in a situation where two Florida delegations (one for Trump and one for Rubio) arrive in Cleveland, and neither will be able to cast votes until the "real" one is selected by the convention.