Blogging From 16th Democratic Senatorial Convention In Dallas

The convention continued without a hitch until the reports from the credentials committee regarding several challenges to delegate counts. Most of the specific cases involved either a miscount or someone voting in the wrong precinct caucus. Some precincts shared a caucus location and that led to confusion.

The real problem came from the credentials committee trying to explain the majority report of a challenge. The majority report found that the delegate count for a particular precinct was off by 2 delegates, though in the end it still wouldn’t change the overall total. Then a minority report was read and people misinterpreted the minority report as a continued challenge. The hall erupted in boos and cheers.

After several minutes a few of us managed to get the chair to explain exactly what the reports meant, and once they were explained, most people voted to accept the reports as read.

BY now unrest had permeated the hall and the crowd had to be silenced by the sergeant at arms several times. Finally someone moved to adopt the recommendations of the bipartisan credentials committee and after a few parliamentary maneuvers that made no difference at all, the motion carried and we could begin the business of the convention.

Now the precincts held caucuses and signed in for each candidate. We elected delegates for the state convention and then waited for the various committees to report.

After a couple of hours of eating bad nachos and waiting, we heard the resolutions submitted by the resolutions committee at 5:45pm just 15 minutes before we had to clear the hall. Since there were 42 different resolutions a movement was made to at least read the titles of the resolutions. Most were cheered, but a few were vague and objections were raised. After SMU agreeing to allow us to continue in the main coliseum, the resolutions were clarified. I had another appointment and had to leave, but I assume they passed with minimal drama since most would be debated again at the State Convention.

After the long day I have to agree with Otto von Bismarck who said there are two things you don’t want to see made, sausage and laws. Well in my lifetime I have seen both and I would still prefer seeing laws made to sausage!