Yesterday, Robert Boatright and Catherine Tolbert’s essay argued that we should hold primary elections on a single, national primary day:

When America adopted primary elections, primaries were hailed as a way to give the public a say in choosing our leaders. Today, fewer than twenty percent of Americans vote in primaries. Primary voters are unrepresentative of the population, registered voters, and even the other members of their parties. Turnout of younger people is extremely low. Turnout fluctuates wildly, depending on whether there is competition in high-profile races. To improve primaries, we must increase the participation, representativeness, and consistency of primary voters. The best way to do this is to hold all congressional and state primaries (though not necessarily presidential primaries) on the same day: a National Primary Day.

Primaries for state and federal office are spread across eighteen dates from March to September.  If all primaries were held on the same day, people would know when to vote. A single-day primary would also attract more national media coverage.  People would know there is a primary even if they knew little about their local candidates. A national primary would also simplify mobilization efforts by parties or interest groups. An organization seeking to increase turnout by a particular demographic group or to highlight the salience of an issue could engage in a nationwide campaign or publicize lists of endorsed candidates. These effects would be felt the most among lower propensity voters, who tend to be younger, less wealthy, and less ideologically extreme than today’s primary voters. The primary electorate would look more like the American population.

There are many secondary effects from having a single-day primary as well. A single-day primary would limit the power of organized interests. The sequential nature of contemporary, low-turnout primaries gives undue power to groups that have sought to encourage extreme candidates and to selectively “primary” incumbents. An increase in turnout would make it more likely that primary victories would be a consequence of voter mobilization, not voter inattention. When primaries do yield unexpected results, we would understand these outcomes in the context of all of the year’s primaries, not as harbingers of what might take place in primaries later in the year.