Perspective

The most important man in politics

You may not have heard of Bill Gardner, but the modest 16-term New Hampshire secretary of statesets the date of America's first primary. That matters a great deal.

By ADAM C. SMITH, Times Political Editor
Published November 4, 2007

CONCORD, N.H. -Visiting one of the most cursed and powerful figures of this presidential election requires wandering amid countless New Hampshire ghosts.

Walk by the Daniel Webster statue outside the granite gold-domed state Capitol and then past the somber portraits of former legislators and Revolutionary War heroes inside. Proceed past the oldest continually operating legislative chamber in America. Finally, inside a spartan walk-in closet of an office with no computer or wall decor, New Hampshire's soft-spoken secretary of state will spend hours regaling you with tales of long-dead farmers, lawyers and assorted other earnest Granite Staters who over hundreds of years helped their state evolve into a paragon of participatory democracy.

"... Then in June of 1775 at Bunker Hill - I did a book on this back 25, 30 years ago, and I have a map of each town and how many from each town - over half the soldiers at Bunker Hill were from New Hampshire," he said in his New Hampshire accent. "And the arms and ammunition supplied there came from here because of the warning from Paul Revere ...!"

For a fellow who comes off more like passionate history professor or amiable back-office bureaucrat than high- stakes political poker player, Bill Gardner drives an awful lot of people nuts. He has sole authority to schedule the all- important New Hampshire presidential primary, and until "Punxsutawney Bill" finally makes that call, the presidential candidates, their elite consultants, party bosses across the country and legions of journalists and campaign minions anxiously ponder the scenarios for how the nomination battles might play out. The unpredictable Gardner, for instance, has not yet ruled out a December New Hampshire primary.

Especially if you're a Florida Democrat officially boycotted by the presidential candidates for having the audacity to schedule its primary nearly as early as New Hampshire's, you probably assume the 59-year-old Gardner is an arrogant heel. A lily-white state where fewer than 300,000 voted in the last presidential primary is more important than Florida, the mother of all swing states? In fact, the most important defender of New Hampshire's early primary is mortified by that pledge to boycott Florida.

"I was very uncomfortable the first day I heard about that pledge. That's not what New Hampshire's about, and Florida did nothing to New Hampshire," he said of the promisedemanded of candidates by state Democratic bosses in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada.

Gardner stressed that while the likes of Sens. Harry Reid in Nevada and Tom Harkin in Iowa and Rep. Jim Clyburn in South Carolina signed a letter urging candidates to sign the pledge, no elected official in New Hampshire would sign it. New Hampshire Democratic chairman Ray Buckley refused to discuss the issue.

Gardner is a Democrat himself who has been repeatedly returned to his post by a Legislature that until recently was controlled by Republicans. He understands that in setting Florida's primary for Jan. 29, Florida lawmakers went out of their way to avoid infringing on New Hampshire's tradition. He understands precedent, that a pledge to a boycott of Florida this year could lead down the line to a pledge to boycott New Hampshire.

And he understands that the central argument of moral authority New Hampshire has for maintaining such outsized influence - power to the people, rather than the insider and power brokers - looks like hogwash alongside New Hampshire's Democratic chairman dictating where candidates can and can't campaign.

"The primary was never for power or money for the state. It was simply that the people here in New Hampshire wanted to make that decision themselves rather than the big shots," he said, recounting how a mostly forgotten farmer named Stephen Bullock in 1913 submitted a bill creating a New Hampshire primary to elect presidential delegates.

To hear him tell it, it sounds like there's something in the DNA of New Hampshirites that's made it destined for such grass roots influence in the nominating system. That pesky diversity question invariably leads to discussion about New Hampshire having the first senator to call for slavery's abolition and being the state that first embraced black and white baseball teams.

This is a tiny state with 400 members in its State House, more than any other state, and a state where the electorate tends to be unimpressed by entourages, big campaign accounts or party establishment backing.

"When someone comes into a living room here or a back yard there are more people that know what it's like to run for office, that know what it's like to hold an office, to have neighbors angry because of some position they took, to get up at a town meeting and talk about the schools and the budget and the teachers," he said.

Some quick Bill Gardner historical bullet points for context:

- In 1776, New Hampshire was first to declare independence.

- In 1831, New Hampshire came up with the idea ofholding a national presidential nominating convention.

- In the 1860s, New Hampshire began holding general elections in March, earlier than any other state.

New Hampshire held its first presidential primary in 1916 and more or less by default soon wound up as the state with the nation's first primary as other states scheduled later elections or switched to caucuses, more easily controlled by party bosses. No one really took much notice until the 1960s, when television coverage began to put New Hampshire in the spotlight.

In 1971, Florida House Speaker Richard Pettigrew tried to grab some of that limelight by moving Florida's primary to the same March date as New Hampshire's, though New Hampshire promptly moved sooner. Ever since, states have been trying to edge New Hampshire aside, and Gardner has been the chief obstacle.

New Hampshire law since 1975 has required New Hampshire to hold its presidential primary seven days before any other state. Gardner, tapped by lawmakers to be secretary of state in 1976, has full authority to set that date, and because New Hampshire has only about 300 precincts statewide, needs little time to put together an election. In 1995, he waited until just before Christmas to set the date.

"He's brought a certain artistry to his role of making sure New Hampshire is first," marvelled state Rep. Jim Splaine, who wrote the 1975 law governing New Hampshire's primary. "He's extraordinarily patient, and extraordinarily intelligent. He doesn't panic."

This year, Gardner's waiting game centers on Michigan, which has tentatively set its primary for Jan. 15. The betting is that New Hampshire will wind up on Jan. 8, but December is not off the table yet. Michigan will likely have to commit by mid November. But Gardner is in no rush to decide.

"For a modest, unassuming man, he has a backbone of steel. Even governors have been unable to change his mind once it's made up," former ambassador and New Hampshire DNC member Terry Shumaker said of Gardner. "He is a truly unique human being who is a student of history and balances what you can learn from history to guard New Hampshire's tradition."

Adam C. Smith can be reached at asmith@sptimes.com or 727 893-8241.

[Last modified November 5, 2007, 07:58:23]