Ron Paul Wins Rescheduled St. Charles County, MO Caucus

Following last month’s turbulent attempted caucus, my county completed a successful GOP caucus last night, and slates of Ron Paul supporters won seats for all 147 delegates going to the party’s district and state conventions in Missouri.

The caucus was probably even less relevant to the actual 2012 nomination than it would have been a month ago. Santorum announced his campaign suspension hours before the event, all but erasing whatever feeble hopes remained that someone but Romney would come up with enough delegates to win the nomination.

But Santorum’s announcement likely contributed to Paul’s win for whatever relevance it still had as far as sending a message to the establishment. At the previous almost-caucus, supporters of Paul, Santorum, and Romney were roughly split by thirds – no one candidate had enough supporters to control the caucus. Based on various votes taken last night, Paul supporters seemed to have 50-100 more people than all the other candidates combined, and based on one vote taken for three different slates, the turnout seemed to be roughly 450 Paul, 300 Romney, 100 Santorum. Remember, Santorum took over 50% of the whole state of Missouri on the meaningless primary and had about one-third of the supporters at the first caucus. If Santorum had not dropped out and just 100 more Santorum supporters had shown up, Paul would not have had a total majority at this one.

This caucus felt much more organized than the last one. Everyone was given an order of events. There were microphones set up around the room and it was clearly defined how to approach the chairman and speak. Votes were taken and counted appropriately. The order of events were followed and there were no disputed votes (except for minor objections by a few who were largely overruled by the entire caucus body).

I was glad to see that Brent Stafford, the caucus chairman successfully nominated by Paul supporters, ran the caucus in an overwhelmingly fair and just manner – in sharp contrast to the way temporary chair Eugene Dokes repeatedly violated the Republican party’s caucus rules at the last caucus. Not only did Stafford diligently follow the rules set forth and explain them to the caucusgoers when necessary, he also went out of his way to do things he was not required to do to placate caucusgoers when disputes arose.

After Stafford was pronounced the caucus chairman by a vote of 480 to 402, there were some objections to the vote result. Stafford accepted challenges and motions about the vote in a conciliatory manner, and he explained the repercussions of proposed actions. Someone objected that Stafford was still at the podium presiding over the dispute about his victory. Stafford had every right to be the chairman at this point, because the talliers had declared his victory and it had not yet been successfully challenged, but in the interest of peace he voluntarily conceded the podium back to the original temporary chairman. It was clear that Stafford’s margin of victory was large enough that even the majority of the Romney supporters did not want to take the time for a recount, and a voice vote quickly resolved the dispute and Stafford resumed his leadership.

Stafford appointed committees with representatives from all the candidates. And when a confused aged Paul supporter randomly came to the mic to declare that he was an Independent supporting Ron Paul, and someone objected that declared non-Republicans were not allowed to be at the caucus, Stafford kindly asked the man to leave. These were definitely not the actions of a Paul supporter trying to “take control” of the caucus and force an unfair victory.

Naturally, many people were unhappy with some of the caucus rules as they proceeded. Some wanted delegates to be forced to declare a presidential candidate preference. Some felt it unfair to elect full slates of candidates by majority vote (where the winning slate gets all the delegates) instead of selecting them proportionally based on the turnout. Others thought it was unfair that everyone got to vote for slates in both the 2nd and 3rd districts instead of only each in their own district. There was much debate and many delays, but Stafford pointed out that the caucus body had voted to approve the rules and also that members of all the campaigns had been aware of the proposed rules before the caucus started. I thought some of these objections were quite reasonable, but there was no will to change what had already been approved; it seemed like every time a new, lengthy vote was held to amend previously-approved rules, more and more caucus goers joined the Paul majority to stop delaying the inevitable.

I greatly enjoyed Bryce Steinhoff’s speech in support of the “Constitutional Conservative” slate (a.k.a. Paul supporters). It was obviously tailored to tempt any wavoring caucusgoers from our very Republican county (I don’t think there was any mention of foreign policy), but it had some great stuff. Steinhoff talked about the dangerous overreach of our federal government, from the TSA to the health care bill to attempts at Internet censorship to the massive debt and deficits. He said the Constitutional Conservatives supported parents being able to raise and homeschool their children instead of letting the federal government raise them. He said they believed the federal government should only have the powers expressly given to it by the Constitution and that everything else should be left to the states. He said we need to get back to our constitutional roots. It was an exciting and inspiring speech.

A woman also spoke for the “Romney” slate, saying things about “freedom” and “prosperity” and something about Romney being a successful businessman. “Romney knows what to do with the economy.” (Of course, my whole bias is that we already have too much trouble with Presidents trying to do stuff with the economy.)

Eventually, we voted on the slates, though not before Romney supporters tried to submit a digital slate, followed by debate about whether “written” rules allowed that until the debate about it stalled long enough for them to print it out. But it didn’t matter; the Constitutional Conservatives won all the votes that followed. After four hours, we finally went home.

I’m glad that our little consternation now has a lawful, democratic, and happy ending. If you want more information, see articles by the STL Post-Dispatch and STL Beacon.