The National Primary

Linda Fowler of Dartmouth College has written an interesting article on our nation's move to what will, in essence, amount to a national primary.

I've never been a fan of the undue attention paid to Iowa and New Hampshire, and I also don't think it was right that the nominees were virtually always decided by the time California had its primary in June. But having the contest finished, or close to finished, by the first week of February doesn't make sense either.

What to do?

I'd really like to see the states agree to a system whereby the states are divided into four or five groups roughly equal in population size. Each Presidential election year, the order in which the primaries are held would rotate among the groups of states, so that no one state would always be first or last. The primaries would be held monthly from February to May or June.

It seems so simple. Why wouldn't it work?