Scattered across the United States, your faithful Mischiefs crew watched the last two days of presidential debates and formed some opinions. We offer those here.

Julia Azari

Identity politics was the winner of the debates.

This is a loaded phrase and I use it deliberately and advisedly. One big question in a field of 20+ candidates — perhaps half of whom are qualified and potentially viable — is which kinds of fault lines will arise. Tension between economic populism and (for example) racial justice has been part of the party’s move to the left.

No one really explicitly addressed that tension in the debates, but it’s notable that the two standard-bearers for left positions on economic issues did not shine on the more identity-related questions. Elizabeth Warren was basically left out of the immigration discussion in the first debate, with Julián Castro setting the agenda and forcing others to respond to him. Bernie Sanders was also tangential to the heated exchange of the second night, in which Kamala Harris took Joe Biden to task for both recent comments and past actions on racial issues. Buttigieg’s answer to questions about his record as mayor of South Bend and a recent incident of police violence is another standout moment of the second night.

Candidates also positioned themselves on gender and LGBT issues. Booker and Castro both mentioned the needs of transgender Americans on the first night. The discussion on Wednesday night also featured the candidates jockeying for who could most forcefully come out in favor of abortion rights and against the Hyde Amendment. On the second night, candidates pushed the envelope less but embraced liberal positions in clear terms. Kirsten Gillibrand highlighted women’s issues (using fairly traditional, gender binary language, in a stark but probably unintentional contrast with Castro). Buttigieg talked about his marriage in his closing statement.

Each night, the candidates answered questions about health care, the overall orientation of the economy (phrased in the second night in terms of socialism), and the need to address the needs of middle class and working American — whatever those terms may mean. The debate structure probably shaped this. If Warren had been on the second night with the other major players, she might have pushed them to address more economic questions and the populist framework in which she (and Sanders) present them. Similarly, if Warren and Sanders had been on the same stage, we might have seen an exchange between them about how exactly the rich and the corporations are messing everything up, and what to do about it.

It’s also worth noting that identity and economics don’t operate in parallel in real life. Marginalization and underrepresentation have economic consequences. But for right now, the discourse in the Democratic primary still kind of treats these as separate tracks, and this week’s debates brought the identity questions into the spotlight. 

Jonathan Ladd

In a crowded presidential field (and this is an extremely crowded field), the first task for most of the candidates is to be considered one of the top three or four contenders. You need to get voters to see you as a serious candidate so you are worth investing attention in learning about, and supporters will not be wasting their votes. 

So the big task for all of the candidates except Joe Biden is getting noticed by viewers and getting attention in post-debate news coverage. No matter how much people like your position or your ability to defeat Trump, you can’t ask people to throw their vote away. In that regard, in the first debate, Warren, Castro, and Booker did what they needed to do, and in the second debate so did Harris, Buttigieg, and Sanders. Add Biden to these six and it’s hard to see how the remaining 13 candidates can get attention going forward.

Kamala Harris’s performance stood out from all 20 candidates over these two nights. That is very hard to do in such a big field. But her ability to clearly press her points, which she has shown as a prosecutor and in Senate hearings, was on display here. Harris, Warren, Castro, and Booker were all able to clearly explain their plans in very limited time. But only Harris showed that she could also effectively go on the attack. Her attack on Biden’s record working with segregationists in the Senate and opposing busing worked both to hit Biden on a weak point and build up her own appeal to the African American community, given that some on the left have criticized her previously as being too aggressive as California Attorney General.

Finally, this was a bad night for Joe Biden. It was completely predictable that he would be attacked. Yet when he was attacked on his most obvious weaknesses — his age, his record on race, and his 2002 vote for the Iraq War — he had no good response to any of them. Compared to the others onstage, especially Harris, his answers were unfocused and his tone was tentative. These weaknesses have the danger of playing into concerns about his age.

Will this hurt Biden in the polls? It’s hard to say. It seems like his African American support is particularly vulnerable to the kind of attacks Harris laid on him. Time will tell. Debates often don’t lead to any movement in the polls, but Biden’s campaign can’t be happy with his performance last night.

Seth Masket

Overall, I didn’t see a lot from these two debates to shake up the larger presidential field. The real action was centered on a handful of candidates: Biden, Booker, Buttigieg, Castro, Harris, Sanders, Warren, maybe Klobuchar, and maybe O’Rourke. These candidates, for the most part, are the ones who have some party support behind them, in terms of endorsements, money, staff, etc. 

I’ll note that the candidates who stand to benefit the most from these debates — especially Booker, Harris, and Warren — are the ones who have been standing out in my surveys of early-state activists but not necessarily dominating public opinion surveys. The strong public performances we saw onstage this week are similar to what those activists have seen in the candidates; they’re just now being made available to the rest of us.

The other candidates got in a few good moments and few did anything to actually embarrass themselves, but they didn’t really do anything to destabilize the rankings, either. Swalwell got in an effective dig at Biden’s age, but that is likely to hurt Biden more than it helps Swalwell. My guess is that this bottom tier of candidates will have a harder time qualifying for later debates as more donors and backers concentrate their support on the upper tier.

It was hard not to be impressed by the exchange between Harris and Biden. Biden’s greatest strength so far in this contest has been his perceived electability; even those who do not necessarily prefer him as a nominee have been willing to support him because they believe he’s the most likely to defeat Trump. Harris, by sharply critiquing him on his recent comments regarding his collegiality with his segregationist colleagues, not only attacked him on an issue of great importance to a vast segment of the Party, but also made him look vulnerable and defensive about his record. His nomination may well still happen, but its aura of inevitability was punctured.

Hans Noel

The last two nights have revealed a new model for debates, building on the foundation that the Republicans began last cycle. Two debates, without even a hint of a top tier and an “undercard,” is the way to go. Even with a field as small as eight or 10 people, I think it makes sense.  

Some worried that spreading the debates over two nights, without an obvious top tier, would be trouble. Would it matter who you were drawn against? I don’t think it was a problem at all. 

Presidential nomination debates have never really been debates, in the sense of conflict over a proposition. They’re definitely not like high school or college competitive debates, or even a legislative debate, where different sides of an issue clash against each other. They have always been more like side-by-side press conferences, especially when there are more than two candidates.

So why not just have a series of press conferences? The “debate’’ format allows for accountability. While journalists can ask follow up questions in a town hall meeting, they often don’t. There is nothing like the incentive of an opponent to make sure a candidate doesn’t get away with anything. When Beto O’Rourke touted his plan for immigration reform, Julián Castro called him out over the details, notably Castro’s call for repealing Section 1325. If the moderators won’t ask Joe Biden about his record on race, Kamala Harris can do it.

None of this requires that all of the candidates be present. At this stage, all we want is to sort out the candidates who deserve more attention from those who do not. If Tim Ryan can’t stand up to criticism from Tulsi Gabbard, he should probably drop out. 

If everyone were on the stage at the same time, or if the “top’’ candidates were together, I don’t think my conclusions would change about who deserves more attention (Harris, Castro, Klobuchar, Gillibrand) and who does not (O’Rourke, Ryan, Yang, Williamson, and, yes, Biden).

We’re going to have a lot more debates, both this cycle and — probably even with reforms to the system — into the future. The split format is a great way to handle a field of eight or more. 

Richard Skinner

These were two bad nights for two old men. Biden and Sanders both looked and acted their age and then some. Biden began well by seeming above some of the squabbling among the other candidates and continually tying himself to Obama. But as the debate went on, he just seemed older and more sluggish. We’ll see how people react to the substance of the Biden-Harris exchange (I’d be pretty surprised if Harris talks about bringing back busing), but their optics were obvious: Harris seemed young, energetic, and unintimidated, while Biden appeared old, defensive, and caught off guard.

Meanwhile, Bernie Sanders kept shouting about the same handful of topics that have always obsessed him. Red-faced and surly, he was probably the most unpleasant presence onstage. Biden seemed like an out-of-touch grandfather whose time has passed, while Sanders was more like an ill-tempered neighbor yelling on his front porch. Everyone will probably forget Wednesday night’s debate, but the candidates who did best were generally the most liberal — Elizabeth Warren, Julián Castro, Cory Booker — and perhaps will compete with Sanders for support.

Kamala Harris put on one of the best debate performances I have ever seen. Sharp, energetic, well-informed, immaculately prepared, she seemed ready to take on Donald Trump. (Her experience as a prosecutor clearly has its advantages). Her attack on Biden’s record on race was expertly choreographed and beautifully delivered. (Smart move making it more about empathy than policy).

Before this debate, most Democratic voters liked Harris but relatively few supported her. This debate could change that. She’s already received an impressive number of endorsements; will her performance garner more? Two potential problems for her: Her call for ending private health insurance could be a real liability in the general election (will she flip-flop again?) and older voters may react differently to her exchange with Biden than did the throngs on Twitter. This could mean that her appeal will be less to the older moderates who currently back Biden and more to the younger liberals who like some of the other candidates.

Oh, there were other candidates? Pete Buttigieg seemed polished and well-informed, but the racial tensions in South Bend are clearly a lingering problem for him. Michael Bennet knew his stuff and made pointed criticisms of the two old men. But I doubt many will remember him. Andrew Yang mercifully said little, while Marianne Williamson not-so-mercifully did not. Eric Swalwell kept trying to make “pass the torch” happen. (Harris could have told him about exploiting the generation gap: “Show, don’t tell.”) Kirsten Gillibrand and John Hickenlooper performed well enough but were dwarfed by the bigger egos onstage.   

Debates rarely have a huge impact, but these may end up boosting Harris and perhaps some of the other mid-range candidates (Warren, Booker, Castro, Buttigieg), while dinging the support of Biden and Sanders. (Does Biden have anyone on his staff who can talk frankly with him about his performance?) I don’t think any of the candidates in the bottom half of the field got much out of these debates, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see many not qualify for the third round in September.

Jennifer Nicoll Victor

The Democratic Party’s first debates are a peek inside the sausage factory of American electoral politics. The process now playing out in public view is one that Democrats have done mostly behind closed doors for the last several generations. Winnowing a wide field of candidates to a single nominee is a complex process involving political connections, experience, policy knowledge, fundraising, and, of course, charisma. Democrats came under fire for following an elite-driven, somewhat closed process in 2016, and as a result they are airing their laundry now to settle on a candidate to oppose Trump. 

On Wednesday night, candidates concentrated on introducing themselves and displaying their qualifications. On Thursday, we saw more candidates position themselves vis-à-vis one another and Trump. The most meaningful exchange of the night was between Harris and Biden on the topic of civil rights. Harris directly challenged the frontrunner using a personal anecdote laced with experience and knowledge. Her example both dated him and exposed a fissure in the Democratic Party that she is trying to use to her advantage: How far are Democrats willing to go to correct civil rights injustices? Importantly, race is also the issue Donald Trump uses to appeal to supporters. In this way, Harris challenged the frontrunner in her party and previewed how she might confront the president.

The last two candidates Democrats have nominated are Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama: big-city, over-educated, policy-wonkish, non-white-men. Of the current field, candidates like Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, Julián Castro, and Elizabeth Warren look most like the party’s most recent choices.

But prior to the debates, Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders were clear frontrunners. While they performed fine in Thursday’s debate, they did not shine. Candidates like Harris and South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg were notable breakouts. Biden is already well known, and so is Sanders to some extent, so the early debates cannot help them that much. But for lesser-known candidates like Harris, Warren, and Booker, the debates can move their needles.

Debates are not likely to shake up the rankings in the field too much because the debate audience is primarily made up of people like those who write for and read Mischiefs of Faction. But, if Kamala Harris becomes the nominee, everyone will point to Thursday’s debate as a key moment on her road to success. 

At a time when Congress has arguably been more contentious than ever, the House Select Committee on Congressional Modernization has been unusually harmonious. Discussions have not followed partisan lines, while witnesses chat amiably with committee members. This is partly due to the committee, so far, avoiding controversial issues such as decentralizing Congress by moving power away from the party leadership. The committee does not have legislative power, and it can only make recommendations with a two-thirds vote. 

On May 23, the committee made its first round of recommendations, suggesting that Congress should:

• Adopt a consistent data structure throughout all parts of the legislative process in order to make it easier to track development and evolution of legislation
• Develop software that shows in real time how proposals would amend legislation and current law
• Update how information is provided to the public
• Develop a database to show whether federal agencies have current funding authorization
• Create a public, centralized database to provide results of committee votes

Most of these recommendations would not profoundly change the operations of Congress. They share two themes: a desire to increase transparency and a faith in technology.

A May 10 hearing on transparency drew out differences on the topic. Daniel Schuman of Demand Progress, Josh Tauberer of GovTrack, and Bob Reeves, deputy clerk of the House of Representatives, discussed ways to use technology to improve transparency, as much within the House as for citizens outside the institution. They discussed creating a legislative branch chief data officer to improve congressional and public access to legislative information and to facilitate the emergence of legislative data standards. They also proposed improving access to lobbying data. 

But Frances Lee of the University of Maryland argued that transparency has often created unintended consequences. She argued that open committee hearings and recorded votes in committee have mostly benefited lobbyists, given that most ordinary citizens pay little attention to the legislative process. But the committee members and the witnesses seemed united by the belief that Congress needs greater internal transparency so that rank-and-file members are better apprised of the happenings in their own body: the content of legislation, the scheduling of votes, the functioning of committees.

On June 5, the committee considered the matter of improving constituent outreach by congressional offices. Right now, Capitol Hill staff are confronting a deluge of constituent email, but much of it is prompted by activist groups and is relatively low-quality. In turn, congressional staff find that most of their responses to constituents are not read. 

Witnesses — including Brad Fitch of the Congressional Management Foundation, Marci Harris of PopVox, and Michael Neblo of Ohio State University — offered a variety of solutions. Online town halls could offer more in-depth engagement between members and constituents. Fitch called for a task force of current congressional press secretaries to devise strategies to update constituent communication. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO) and the witnesses agreed on the insight that, due to the decline in local news, many citizens only pay attention to the federal government. As such, members of Congress often find themselves contacted about purely local issues. 

All participants seemed united in their belief that Capitol Hill was far behind the times technologically. Congressional offices could share information about innovations, while Congress could buy computer equipment in bulk. 

Other issues could spark greater controversy. Many observers see the low pay for congressional staff as one of the factors that diminish congressional effectiveness. Increasing salaries for congressional staff could potentially require increasing congressional pay, an always-controversial idea. In their testimony before the committee, members of Congress made a variety of arguments in favor of increasing pay for congressional staff: the need to compete with lobbying firms, the private sector, and the executive branch; the desire to have a more diverse pool of congressional staff; the high cost of living in Washington, DC. But the recent revolt against increasing congressional pay makes such a shift seem unlikely.

The committee has discussed improving the hiring process, paying interns, diversifying staff, and improving staff benefits — goals that may pose less political danger. Members, both former and current, have discussed the desire to decentralize power away from the party leadership, But so far, the committee has not dwelled on this issue.

The select committee will continue its work over the year. Even if its recommendations do not become law, it can still add to the broader movement to restore congressional capacity. And even if the committee does not propose any changes that will radically alter the functioning of Congress, gradual improvements may still be worthwhile. Congress watchers are eagerly awaiting further recommendations from the committee.

We may be approaching the third* presidential impeachment effort of the past half century. There was widespread talk after Richard Nixon’s resignation that the “system had worked” despite the strain of a criminal president. Bill Clinton’s impeachment arguably placed the system under far less pressure; only the most obsessed Clinton haters thought his misdeeds approached the severity of Nixon’s crimes, while there never was a serious chance that Clinton would be removed from office. 

Indeed, it’s hard to see any long-lasting legacy of the Clinton impeachment. It probably hurt Republicans in the 1998 midterms. The Clinton-Lewinsky scandal may have cost Democrats the 2000 presidential election, but it likely would have been a prominent issue whether or not Republicans had impeached Clinton.  Nor did the Clinton impeachment rein in the executive branch, as Watergate did, at least temporarily. None of the presidents who have followed Clinton have been known for their deference to Congress. The Clinton impeachment may not have been history repeating itself as farce; it now appears to have been like a fearsome storm that howled briefly but left no enduring mark on the landscape.

But it’s Watergate that should most interest us now. Unlike the Clinton impeachment, it ended with Nixon leaving office in disgrace, resigning to avoid certain impeachment and removal. At least temporarily, it marked the rollback of the “Imperial Presidency” that had grown since the 1930s and 1940s. It was accompanied by a wide range of legislation meant to protect the power of Congress. Unlike the case of the Clinton impeachment, few people regretted the end of Richard Nixon’s presidency.

The central difference between our political system and that of the Watergate era is that then political parties were weak but nonpartisan elites were strong. Today, while parties may not be strong per se, nonpartisan elites — the media, the civil service, the bar, Congress itself — have lost much of their prestige. They have also lost much of their political independence.

Unlike Trump, Richard Nixon faced a Congress entirely in Democratic hands. Democrats had control of committee chairmanships and the legislative agenda. If many of those Democrats were relatively conservative, few felt especially warmly toward Nixon, whose presidency had featured numerous attempts to circumvent Congress. Democrats had an obvious partisan incentive to undermine Nixon’s presidency. Given that they had been in control for almost two decades, Democrats felt secure in their power.  By contrast, we are in an era of “insecure majorities,” and the new Democratic majority feels vulnerable, especially given how many freshmen come from districts that voted for Trump or Mitt Romney.

But there were also elements of bipartisanship that were critical to Watergate. In the 1970s, American politics was at its lowest point of partisan polarization. Ticket-splitting was at its highest, congressional party unity was at its lowest. This made it easier for members of both parties to oppose Nixon in 1973-74. Many moderate and conservative Democrats played critical roles in Watergate. They couldn’t be dismissed as knee-jerk opponents of Nixon or as sour-grapes McGovernites. Robert Byrd may have been the Senate Democratic whip, yet he was also conservative enough for Nixon to toy with putting him on the Supreme Court. He pressured FBI director-designate L. Patrick Gray to testify at his confirmation hearing that Nixon had sought to involve him in the coverup of the Watergate burglary.  

Sam Ervin gained national fame as the chair of the Senate Select Committee on Watergate. But he was also a segregationist and a Vietnam hawk who had little in common with the liberals who came to idolize him during the televised hearings he ran in the summer of 1973. (When the committee began its hearings in May, Nixon’s approval rating was at 44 percent; by the end of the summer, it had fallen to 33 percent). Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield (D-MT) wisely picked Ervin as chairman of the select committee. Ervin’s reputation as a Senate institutionalist and an ideological conservative helped convince Republicans and Southern Democrats to support the creation of the panel. In the end, the committee was approved by a 77-0 margin in February 1973 — when Watergate was still a below-the-fold story.

Moderate and liberal Republicans did even more to bring down Nixon who, in many ways, was one of them. In a ticket-splitting era, politicians could still build reputations independent of their parties. Sen. Lowell Weicker (R-CT), a member of the Senate committee, grilled witnesses in a fashion that enraged the Nixon White House. Attorney General Elliot Richardson and Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus refused the president’s order to fire special prosecutor Archibald Cox. In the aftermath of the ensuing Saturday Night Massacre, multiple liberal Republicans turned against Nixon.

Republicans on the bench played a vital role, too. U.S. v. Nixon, the decision that required Nixon to hand over the Oval Office tapes, was credited to Chief Justice Warren Burger, whom the president himself appointed. It was actually mostly written by Justice Potter Stewart, an Eisenhower appointee whom Nixon considered naming as Chief Justice. Even John Sirica, the District Court Judge whose hard-line tactics helped foil the Watergate coverup, was a Republican.

Not only was the 1970s Congress less partisan than today’s, but it was more decentralized and less dominated by leadership. Speaker of the House Carl Albert could best be described as an ineffective alcoholic, and neither Mansfield nor Senate Republican leader Hugh Scott were particularly vigorous figures. The institutional leadership of the Republican Party — Scott, House Republican leader John Rhodes, RNC chairman George H. W. Bush — did not break with Nixon until his presidency appeared mortally wounded in the summer of 1974. Democratic party leadership played important roles in the Watergate investigation, but mostly behind the scenes: Mansfield devising the Senate select committee, House Majority leader Tip O’Neill laying the procedural groundwork for impeachment. 

Instead, committees took the lead, first the Senate Judiciary committee, then the Senate Select committee, finally the House Judiciary committee. The confirmation hearings for Gray and Richardson gave members of the Senate Judiciary Committee the opportunity to extract concessions and admissions. Most notably, Richardson agreed to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Watergate. These committees were ultimately characterized by bipartisan cooperation, both among staff and rank-and-file members. A critical group of mostly moderate Republicans and Southern Democrats composed the so-called “Fragile Coalition” on the House Judiciary Committee. Their deliberations helped build bipartisan support for impeachment. 

As Frances Lee notes in Beyond Ideology, much partisan behavior is driven not by philosophical differences but by “team” behavior aimed at gaining power. During the early stages of Watergate, Republicans did act as a “team” in support of Nixon. Both House Republican leader Gerald Ford and Senate Watergate committee ranking Republican Howard Baker took action early on to protect the Nixon White House. But as Nixon’s political stature crumbled in the spring and summer of 1974, his support among Republican politicians also slipped. His approval among Republican voters had already fallen from near-unanimity in the wake of the 1972 election to barely half at the end of the 1973.

The mass media, particularly the Washington Post, was critical to keeping the Watergate story going in its early days. The Nixon administration sought to discredit unfavorable reporting as the work of a biased press keen to bring down its sworn enemy. 

That argument did not prevent the American public from turning against Nixon. But it might be more effective today. As Jonathan Ladd notes in Why Americans Hate the News Media and Why It Matters, Americans’ trust in the mass media has fallen dramatically over the past few decades. During Watergate, the conservative media was generally supportive of Nixon, but in the coverup’s infancy, media coverage was mostly limited to the National Review, the newsletter Human Events, and a few radio commentators. Almost all Americans got their news from TV network news or newspapers that carefully avoided open political bias. Today, the conservative media has sprouted what David Frum calls the “conservative political-entertainment complex,” and Fox News and Rush Limbaugh attract audiences in the millions. Trump’s message that the mainstream media cannot be trusted finds a more receptive audience than Nixon found, and a more elaborate apparatus to spread it.

Watergate occurred just as Congress was expanding its institutional capacity in the wake of the Legislative Reorganization Act of 1970 and in response to decades of growth in presidential power. Staff was increased, and legislative support agencies such as the Congressional Research Service and the General Accounting Office were beefed up. The 1970s were an era when members of Congress were more willing to defend their institution, even when that meant crossing party lines. By contrast, recent decades have seen the legislative branch steadily lose power to the executive. 

What would it mean for the political system to not handle the current crisis well? This could cover a range of undesirable outcomes:

• A criminal president remaining in office despite committing acts that would justify his removal.
• An impeachment along narrowly partisan lines, perhaps followed by a farcical trial in the Senate — or no trial at all.
• A president using the impeachment process to rally his supporters, perhaps also persuading swing voters that Democrats are “out of control.”
• Congress failing to obtain information that the public deserves to see. 
• Congress continuing to lose power to the executive.

But history does not only offer us lessons to despair. Trump’s narrow, flukish electoral victory bears no resemblance to Nixon’s 49-state landslide of 1972. The 2020 election approaches, with a Trump defeat seeming very plausible. With two impeachment processes within living memory, the prospect of removing a president is far more imaginable than it was in 1974. Donald Trump has frequently shown bizarre political judgment, while Nixon was generally careful in public statements, avoiding anything that would implicate him. 

Finally, Nixon had at least some good will from his fellow politicians, despite his poor personal relations with so many of them. He was, after all, the president who opened relations with China, negotiated arms control with the Soviets, and created the Environmental Protection Administration. He was a political veteran who could draw upon relationships that had lasted for a quarter century or more. After the release of the “smoking gun” tape, Rep. Charles Wiggins (R-CA), perhaps the president’s most able defender on the House Judiciary Committee, admitted that the time had come to end the “magnificent public career of Richard Nixon.” Outside of Mar-a-Lago, it’s hard to imagine anyone saying such words about Donald Trump.

* There was talk of impeaching Reagan for Iran-Contra, George W. Bush for the Iraq War, and Obama over the various obsessions of the right-wing fever swamps, but none of these cases amounted to much.

The author wishes to thank Philip Klinkner of Hamilton College for his contributions to this article.

Previous essays in this series have addressed fundamental flaws in the Constitution: the ill-defined nature of presidential powers, the malapportionment of the Senate, the Electoral College. But I wish to draw my readers’ attention to a less central, but still important defect: the requirement, stated in Article II, Section 2, that presidents be “natural-born” citizens. 

While it may appear to be a minor issue, this qualification relies on an ill-defined term that leaves some Americans in doubt regarding their eligibility to serve as president. It also bestows a mark of shame on millions of loyal Americans and deprives all of us of the potential service that would be given by otherwise able and qualified.

The “natural-born” clause was added to the Constitution during the closing weeks of the Convention, after the other qualifications had already been approved. There was no debate on this provision, forcing future scholars to guess at the delegates’ intent. The most common explanation has been that they feared that a foreign nation might send an agent to insinuate his way into American politics. 

In July 1787, John Jay (then secretary of foreign affairs under the Articles of Confederation) wrote to George Washington that only a “natural born” citizen should be allowed to become president, arguing that this requirement would provide a check on the ability of foreigners to influence the young republic. 

There is no direct evidence that Jay’s letter influenced the writing of the Constitution, but scholars have tended to see it as the most likely means by which the “natural born” phrase entered the convention’s deliberation. (Alexander Hamilton also proposed a draft plan for the Constitution that included language declaring that only those born as citizens could serve as president but did not use the phrase “natural born.”) 

Both Hamilton’s draft and the Constitution included language declaring that anyone who was an American citizen at the time of the Constitution’s adoption would automatically be eligible to serve as president, regardless of place of birth.

Fear of a foreign president

The delegates had some historical grounds for fearing that foreign powers might try to influence American politics. During the waning years of the Kingdom of Poland, which had an elective monarchy, outside powers (particularly Russia) intrigued in the selection of the king. Those same powers would soon gobble up Poland. There were various rumors circulated in the colonies that this or that European aristocrat might be plotting to gain power in the United States.  

The term “natural born” had its roots in English common law. Those born on English soil were considered automatically English subjects, even if their parents were foreigners. But there was also centuries of precedent and law supporting the “natural born” status of those born outside England to English-subject parents. This doctrine was confirmed in the Naturalization Act of 1790, which declared the foreign-born children of US citizens to be “natural born” citizens. But subsequent laws altered this principle just enough to confuse.  

“Birthright citizenship” was confirmed in a series of court cases in the nineteenth century and was explicitly stated in the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.” (This overturned Dred Scott’s ruling that African Americans were not citizens).

In US v. Wong Kim Ark (1898), the Supreme Court declared that Wong Kim Ark, the US-born son of Chinese-citizen parents, was a “natural born” citizen despite his parents’ inability to become citizens under the shameful law then in effect.  

Naturally born eligible?

The “natural-born” clause has had a troubled history. Most notably, there have been several “gray areas” of eligibility. These have included:

• US citizens’ children who were born abroad
• US citizens born in unincorporated territories such as Puerto Rico
• Native Americans born on reservations
• Foreign-born children adopted by US parents

It is worth noting that two categories of US citizens have not faced serious dispute in terms of their eligibility to serve as president. Under common law, the 14th Amendment, and Wong Kim Ark, those born in the United States to noncitizen parents are considered natural-born citizens. And naturalized citizens have never been deemed natural-born.

Over the years, several (announced or potential) presidential candidates have been accused of not being natural-born:

• President Chester Alan Arthur’s father was born a British subject in Ireland, later moved to Canada, and finally came to the United States. His mother was a US citizen, although she lived in Canada for a time. Arthur’s political opponents claimed variously that Arthur was born in Ireland or in Canada. Arthur’s father did not become a naturalized citizen until Arthur was fifteen years old. Had Arthur been born outside the United States, under the law in effect at his birth, he would not be considered a “natural born” citizen, given that his father was not a US citizen. Arthur always asserted that he was born in Vermont and no one was able to prove otherwise.
• Charles Evans Hughes’s father was also born a British subject; he never became a US citizen. When he became the Republican presidential nominee in 1916, a prominent Democrat alleged that Hughes was not a natural-born citizen, despite being born in the United States.
• Christian Herter, a onetime governor of Massachusetts and later secretary of state under Eisenhower, was discussed as a potential running mate for Ike in 1956 (to replace Nixon) and as a possible Republican presidential candidate in 1960. Herter was born in Paris to expatriate American parents. (The same was true for Sen. Lowell Weicker, who toyed with a run in 1980).
• Barry Goldwater, the 1964 Republican presidential nominee, was born in Arizona Territory three years before it became a state.
• Michigan Gov. George Romney was born in Mexico to US citizen parents who had left the country to escape a federal prohibition on polygamy. He sought the Republican presidential nomination in 1968 but withdrew long before the convention.
• John McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone to US citizen parents. In 2008, the US Senate passed a nonbinding resolution declaring him to be a natural-born citizen.
• Barack Obama was born in the United States to a British-subject father and a US-citizen mother. While his natural-born status was never actually in dispute, that did not prevent the growth of a vast conspiracy-theory industry.
• Ted Cruz was born in Canada to a US citizen mother and a Cuban refugee father (who was also a legal resident of the United States). His parents were living in Canada temporarily. Cruz was considered a dual US-Canadian citizen at birth; he later disavowed his Canadian citizenship. Nonetheless, he also was subjected to charges that he was ineligible to serve as president.

The courts have never actually ruled on the eligibility of a presidential candidate based on citizenship status. Most of these challenges now appear silly or dishonest (although people at the time seemed to have taken the doubts about Romney’s “natural born” status seriously). But the possibility that the courts might rule on the eligibility of a presidential candidate to serve remains. 

There is also the concern of a constitutionally ineligible or “gray area” person serving in the presidential line of succession: While the 12th Amendment specifically requires vice presidents to be constitutionally eligible to serve as president, there is no such requirement for members of the Cabinet. Indeed, several have either been naturalized or otherwise born abroad.

Let Americans choose

There are about 20 million naturalized citizens in the United States. Americans are denied the ability to judge qualifications of these fellow citizens to serve in the nation’s two highest offices. While the number of naturalized citizens who have served in other top political positions is not large, it is not trivial. They include Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger and Madeleine Albright, former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, and former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm. 

The “natural born” clause is different from the other qualifications for office. After all, most people who are not yet 35 years old will someday turn 35. If someone has not resided in the United States for 14 years, they can always stay a little longer. But naturalized citizens cannot become “natural born,” no matter how they seek to prove their loyalty. 

Indeed, citizenship status seems a most imperfect proxy for loyalty to country, given that hundreds of naturalized citizens have won the Medal of Honor, while spies Robert Hanssen, Aldrich Ames, and Alger Hiss were all “natural born.” The president most suspected of ties to a foreign power is indisputably “natural born,” but he rose to power based on promotion of a conspiracy theory that claimed his predecessor was not. Why not let the American people judge? 

How we can remedy this situation? Periodically, statutes have been proposed to rectify some of the “gray areas;” most often, to declare explicitly that the foreign-born children of US citizen parents are “natural born” citizens. But the clause’s most serious defect is the prohibition on naturalized citizens serving as president. That probably can only be fixed with a constitutional amendment. 

These have also been periodically offered, most recently in 2004, during Arnold Schwarzenegger’s peak as a political phenomenon. It would be a tough path. Constitutional amendments are hard to pass, while public opinion appears hostile. But it would be worth it to erase the one legal blemish on the rights of naturalized citizens. (For more information, see a Congressional Research Service report, “Qualifications for President and the “Natural Born” Citizenship Eligibility Requirement.”)

The politics of Virginia have been turned upside down by the revelations of past racist behavior by Gov. Ralph Northam and Attorney General Mark Herring, and by the accusations of sexual assault against Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax. 

These stories have been met by a flood of demands for the resignations of the  officeholders. Demands have come from members of both parties, but Democrats have more often tied their statements to the #MeToo movement and to the growing demand for “zero tolerance” of racism and sexism. (There’s evidence that Republicans have a far more negative view of #MeToo and are also less concerned about the misbehavior of their own politicians.) So far, all three have refused to step down, although Fairfax may yet face a formal investigation by the Virginia General Assembly. He could also be prosecuted in Massachusetts or North Carolina, where the alleged misconduct took place.

The call for Northam’s resignation is consistent with a practice of calling on individuals to step down for wrongdoing that has not been prosecuted or is not precisely of a criminal nature. The resignation of Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) in 2017 exemplifies this shift toward a “zero tolerance” approach. It fit the spirit of the #MeToo movement, but it also served the interests of the Democratic Party. At the time, a Senate runoff election was being waged in Alabama in which allegations of sexual misconduct had been leveled against Republican candidate Roy Moore. (Since there was a Democratic governor of Minnesota, there was no immediate danger of the party losing the seat.)  

There is also some evidence that resignation from Congress due to personal scandal has become more common in recent years. Most notably, Sen. Bob Packwood (R-OR) stepped down in 1995 due to charges of sexual misconduct, although he was also facing a serious attempt to expel him from the Senate. Sen. John Ensign, a Nevada Republican, quit under similar circumstances in 2011. Reps. John Conyers (D-MI), Blake Farenthold (R-TX), Tim Murphy (R-PA), and Trent Franks (R-AZ) all resigned during the last Congress due to personal scandal.

But it is generally hard to make an elected official — especially an executive — give up an office. Business executives and political appointees can be fired. People can refuse to work with an entertainer like R. Kelly or Louis C.K. But few people can “fire” an elected official before the expiration of his or her term. 

Impeachment is rare and difficult. Historically, 20 members of Congress have been expelled, but almost all of them were kicked out for supporting the Confederacy during the Civil War. The failed attempt by Thomas Jefferson’s allies to remove Supreme Court Justice Samuel Chase established the norm that impeachment should not be employed as a political tool, while the public backlash against Bill Clinton’s impeachment further reinforced it. 

Only eight governors have been impeached and removed from office, most recently Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich in 2009. Most of these governors had been involved in blatant criminal misconduct. Most states follow an impeachment process modeled on that of the federal government: a majority vote of the lower House and a two-thirds vote of the upper House. It’s not an insuperable barrier. 

According to my own count, 95 governors have resigned from office since 1900. But 76 of them did so voluntarily in order to accept another job. Most often, they stepped down to serve in the US Senate, join a president’s Cabinet, or accept another appointive position such as an ambassadorship or judgeship. There might have been some cases where a governor was “kicked upstairs” to escape a political imbroglio, the most famous example of which came in 1950, when Harry Truman named scandal-plagued New York City Mayor William O’Dwyer as ambassador to Mexico. (Yes, it was a controversial decision.) But in most of these cases, the governor probably perceived of the new job as a promotion. 

Five governors have resigned due to poor health. It’s also possible that this was a cover for a political problem, but the last governor to do so, Ella Grasso of Connecticut, died a few months after stepping down, so there’s some truth there. Three governors have resigned due to miscellaneous reasons that were essentially voluntary. Harold Stassen resigned during World War II to join the US Navy. Nelson Rockefeller resigned ostensibly to head two commissions but really to plan a 1976 presidential run. Sarah Palin resigned in 2009 to devote herself full time to being Sarah Palin.

Eleven governors have resigned due to scandal. Of those, nine faced an imminent threat of impeachment or criminal prosecution. Mostly recently, Eric Greitens of Missouri and Robert Bentley of Alabama stepped down rather than be removed by impeachment. Nobody in Virginia seems to have thought impeachment an appropriate remedy for Northam, although Fairfax might still face such a process. Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber and New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer quit while under ethical fire, although ultimately they were not prosecuted. Only New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey resigned in a situation in any way comparable Northam’s, essentially quitting out of embarrassment.

The “zero tolerance” doctrine demands that violators leave office immediately, but the political parties lack the tools to enforce it. There is little ability to force scandal-plagued politicians out of office. Many of them are already facing pariah status. Most will never stand for reelection: Northam is term-limited, and it seems unlikely that Fairfax will ever face the voters again.  

Party leaders can appeal to a politician’s family. They can offer informal help with future employment. Staff and Cabinet members can threaten to quit. (That might have been an additional source of pressure on Northam had the Fairfax affair not exploded.) But barring the rare circumstances of impeachment or expulsion, there’s little ability to force elected officials out of their positions.

Our era of nationalized and negative partisanship cuts both ways. On the one hand, there is more national attention to these scandals than there was a generation ago. Cable news and social media can make a juicy story the topic of national conversation within hours. In an era when a nationalized party image tends to override personal characteristics, it’s not surprising that leading Democrats were quick to call on Northam to resign. The growing intensity of the 2020 presidential race probably contributed to the pile-on, as candidates wanted to show their outrage. 

On the other hand, partisans are more reluctant than ever to accept a “loss.” While there were a variety of reasons for Attorney General Mark Herring not to face the same clamor for his resignation, perhaps the most relevant factor is that the Republican-controlled legislature would pick Herring’s successor. Impeaching any of the three Virginia politicians would require Republican help — and it doesn’t appear that the Virginia GOP sees any need to help Democrats escape their current predicament.

Ironically, it is not clear that the public shares the Democratic elite’s desire for “zero tolerance.” Public opinion polling on Northam varies but generally shows something less than universal support for the governor’s resignation. Even after Franken stepped down, he remained a popular figure with many liberal activists, and his antagonist Kirsten Gillibrand faces continuing skepticism from Democrats that appears to be thwarting her presidential ambitions. 

There’s also evidence that the “zero tolerance” standard has a partisan edge: Polling shows that Democrats believe sexual misconduct is a problem for both parties, while Republicans see it as a problem only for Democrats. Through their continuing support for Donald Trump, Republicans have shown their willingness to overlook multiple accusations of sexual assault. They have shown that their tolerance for misconduct is well above zero.

Last week, for once, the political world focused on Congress. We heard about Nancy Pelosi’s return as speaker; the large, diverse freshman class in the House of Representatives; and the controversial comments by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib.

But less attention was given to a proposal adopted by a 418-12 House vote, which created the Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress, chaired by Rep. Derek Kilmer (D-WA). The committee won’t have legislative authority, but it could mark a shift in Congress’s role in our political system.

This political moment offers an unusual opportunity for Congress to assert itself. The past three decades have seen the revival of the “imperial presidency,” as chief executives of both parties have shaken off the restraints imposed upon them in the 1970s. More recently, Congress has reduced its own ability to make policy and defend its constitutional role. For example, as speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich cut funding for the legislative support agencies (including abolishing the Office of Technology Assessment) and reduced the power of committees.

But the midterm elections have produced a large freshman class, mostly Democrats, many of whom have pledged to rein in the Trump administration. In the mid-1970s, the combination of unpopular presidents and an assertive Congress led to a series of efforts to rein in the legislative branch. 

Congress has sought to modernize itself before. Executive power increased dramatically in the 1930s and 1940s, as the New Deal and World War II tended to concentrate power in the presidency. In addition, the growth of government created a sprawling bureaucracy that Congress was ill-suited to oversee.

In response, the APSA Committee on Congress issued a series of recommendations in 1945, which included professionalizing Congress by increasing salaries and retirement benefits for members. But it also called for improving Congress’s access to expertise by expanding committee and member staff as well as the then-infant legislative support agencies.   

They also called for rationalizing the then-sprawling committee system. Most of the committee’s recommendations were adopted by the Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress, and, in turn, passed by Congress in the Legislative Reorganization Act of 1946. 

Some of the committee’s recommendations — creating a legislative budget process, reducing the role of seniority — were not accepted at the time but were implemented in the 1970s.  

The Legislative Reorganization Act of 1970 did not have the same impact as its predecessor, but it contributed to the shift in power away from committee chairs that would characterize that decade. It also led to the public recording of votes on amendments. Another attempt at legislative reorganization in 1993 and ’94 fell apart due to inter-chamber conflicts and disagreements among House Democrats.

To that end, what should be the goals of legislative modernization today? 

To strengthen Congress’s capacity to deliberate: The highly centralized, intensely partisan Congress of the past generation has lost much of its ability to consider policy alternatives. Individual members often find that their duties are mostly limited to raising funds and voting the party line. The decline of institutional expertise has made Congress dependent on outside, often self-interested, sources of information.

To allow Congress to live up to its constitutional responsibilities: Power has flowed away from Capitol Hill for at least three decades. Given the current dysfunction of the executive branch, the time is right for Congress to assert itself once more.  

To free Congress from dependence on lobbyists: Lobbyists have a legitimate role in our political system, but Congress has become too reliant on their expertise. Low salaries for staff have led too many talented young people to leave Capitol Hill for K Street, robbing Congress of valuable expertise. 

To reduce partisanship — or at least to manage it better: Strengthening committees’ role in the legislative process could open the door for more legislation that crosses party lines. It could also give more rank-and-file members constructive roles to play.

The Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress can draw upon a growing community of scholars and activists committed to improving legislative capacity. They can be found at entities such as the Bipartisan Policy Center, the Legislative Branch Capacity Working Group, Demand Progress, the Congressional Management Foundation, the Resilient Democracy Coalition, the New America Foundation, the Democracy Fund, and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. Some of the ideas that have been popular among the legislative capacity community include:

• Revitalizing the legislative support agencies, including bringing back the Office of Technology Assessment.
• Expanding and professionalizing congressional staff, particularly on committees. 
• Strengthening the role of committees in the legislative process, reversing the continuing centralization of power, especially in the House of Representatives.
• Bringing back earmarks.
• Improving Congress’s access to information technology.

The establishment of the Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress is only one step in restoring the legislative branch to its appropriate role in our political system. But it is important that, during its first week in session, the new House of Representatives has shown that it cares about expanding its capacity to govern.

There are many, many frustrating elements to this administration. But perhaps the most basic is that it’s not easy to figure out what Donald Trump actually wants out of the presidency.

Most presidents have multiple goals for the office:

• Accomplish the policy objectives of their party
• Accomplish their own policy objectives
• Win reelection, and perhaps elect a chosen successor
• Some sense of “public service”
• Lead the nation in times of crisis
• Build their own power
• Boost their egos

Only the last clearly matters to Trump. Otherwise, his behavior doesn’t seem to make sense in pursuit of any of these goals.

Accomplish the policy objectives of their party. Probably the strongest predictor of presidential behavior is political party. Democrats and Republicans tend to act in systematically different ways. That has been more true since about 1980, in the era of what I have called the “partisan presidency.” Trump would seem to be an exception to this pattern. He was a newcomer to Republican politics. Few party “insiders” supported his candidacy, and even after he won the nomination, many top Republicans seemed distinctly cool to the prospect of him as president. He was all over the map on issues: sometimes vague, sometimes centrist, sometimes populist, sometimes conventionally conservative.

As president, Trump has mostly pursued Republican policies: repeal of the Affordable Care Act, lower taxes, conservative judges, rollback of environmental regulations. There has been little movement on more centrist objectives such as infrastructure. As a candidate, Trump sometimes sent signals that he might be more secular and less socially conservative than other Republicans. But as president, he’s been more loyal to the religious right than arguably any other constituency.

But Trump doesn’t seem able or willing to try to accomplish these goals. He has purged the White House of most figures with good relationships with congressional Republicans. He did little to help Republicans pass Affordable Care Act repeal, but then denounced them for giving up after passage failed in the Senate. (He gets along with Democrats even less.) Trump seems more committed to pointless feuds than to achieving policy ends.

Accomplish their own policy objectives. While most presidents pursue partisan policy goals, they usually have their own aims as well. At times, Donald Trump has espoused a nationalist/populist/authoritarian agenda on immigration, trade, law enforcement, and foreign policy. This worldview sometimes embraced a more interventionist approach to the economy. Much of this program has been discarded or placed on the back burner.

But Attorney General Jeff Sessions has been the most effective figure in accomplishing Trumpist goals. He was the first prominent elected Republican to endorse Trump. He embraced restrictionist views on immigration before Trump himself did. He has filled the Justice Department with reasonably capable appointees. He is pursuing a Trumpist agenda on immigration, affirmative action, voting rights, and law enforcement. How has Trump repaid him? By abusing and humiliating him.

Win reelection. Trump is quite unpopular (and becoming more so), and he doesn’t seem interested in changing that. He has doubled and tripled down on appealing to his base. He has conducted little outreach to Democrats or swing voters. Most of the policies he backs are unpopular. He is also personally disliked. He enjoys his strongest ratings on the economy, which is one area where he has done little while benefiting from the good luck of inheriting prosperity. If Trump were more concerned with seeking broad popularity, he would have steered a centrist course on health care, shut down his Twitter account, and become far more restrained in his public statements. He has not done any of these.

“Public service.” Since George Washington, some presidents seem to have been motivated mostly by a sense of public service — Dwight Eisenhower and George H.W. Bush fall into this category. It’s safe to say that Trump does not.

Lead the nation in crisis. Many of the presidents of the Cold War era sought to lead the nation during a time of crisis. As with the economy, Donald Trump has been lucky to take office in a relatively tranquil era. He does face foreign policy challenges in North Korea and Syria. But he appears more concerned with his personal grievances.

Build power. Whatever else presidents do, they must amass power. This can go well beyond the formal powers granted by the Constitution. As Richard Neustadt wrote in Presidential Power and the Modern Presidents, “presidential power is the power to persuade.” Presidents need to gain the assistance of other actors both in and outside of government. But Trump instead seems bent on alienating every other power center in Washington. He could turn to the executive branch as a source of power. But with a few exceptions, he has not. He has failed to fill vacancies, and his antics must discourage potential appointees. He browbeats career civil servants but rarely follows through on his rants.

Trump could serve as a negative example supporting Neustadt, showing what happens if you do not care about your reputation with other political actors, and if you show little interest in bargaining with them.

Boost his ego. Most presidents are highly ambitious. Many have had streaks of vanity, such as Richard Nixon, who briefly dressed White House guards in garish outfits patterned after their European counterparts. But Trump seems more obsessed with this part of the job than his predecessors. I once noted that Trump’s presidential bid seemed like an exercise in consumption — the campaign itself was its own reward. Much the same could be said of the Trump presidency.

What Trump seems most focused on

The previous motives could apply to most previous presidents. But there are two that are (mostly) unique to Trump:

Enriching himself. Donald Trump really is unique among presidents in the degree to which he seems uninhibited in his desire to use the presidency to enrich himself and his family. (Plenty of ex-presidents, most notably Gerald Ford and Bill Clinton, have made millions after leaving office. But that doesn’t seem to have motivated their behavior during their presidencies.)

Staying out of jail. Alas, Donald Trump is not the only president for whom this is a major goal. The last year of Richard Nixon’s presidency was consumed with the quest to hold on to the presidency or, at the very least, keep himself out of the clink.

So what has Trump been about in the first half of his first year as president? Mostly about Trump. His policies have been more conventionally Republican than expected, but he does not seem especially motivated in trying to accomplish substantive goals. The appointment of John Kelly as White House chief of staff indicates that Trump might be seeking to become more effective. But to what end?

The eyes of the political world are fixed on the Sixth District of Georgia, located in the upscale northern suburbs of Atlanta. Last week, Democrat Jon Ossoff stunned many observers by winning 48 percent in an all-party “jungle” primary; in June, he will face Republican Karen Handel in a runoff.

The Georgia Sixth has a long Republican history; Newt Gingrich represented it when he was speaker of the House, and GOP candidates usually win here by double-digit margins. (It is not the same district that elected Gingrich from 1978 through 1990 — the Sixth’s lines were altered radically by Georgia Democrats in an unsuccessful effort to push Gingrich out of Congress. But it’s safe to say that the territory that makes up the current Sixth has been safely Republican since the Nixon era.) It was vacated when Rep. Tom Price was confirmed as Donald Trump’s secretary of health and human services.

The race to fill the Sixth has at least two unusual features. First, while the district is traditionally Republican, Donald Trump seriously underperformed here, winning it by a 1.5-point margin. Suburban Atlanta’s highly educated, high-income residents did not warm to Trump’s populism or his outrageous persona. So while the GOP appeared to enjoy an advantage, Democrats had an opening.

Second, the jungle primary posed serious problems for both parties. Republicans quickly attracted several candidates, including “insiders” like former Secretary of State Karen Handel, state Sen. Judson Hill, and former state Sen. Dan Moody, as well as some self-styled “outsiders.” The Democrats, without much of a bench in this country club GOP territory, did not have any well-known candidates. (The district’s only prominent Democratic officeholder, state Rep. Scott Holcomb, passed on the race early.) Given their weak presence in the Sixth, Democrats risked being shut out of a runoff. In both cases, the formal parties could not actually endorse candidates in the “jungle” primaries.

Actors in both parties faced significant collective action problems. Democrats risked scattering their votes, and potentially not making the runoff. Ossoff, a 30-year-old documentary filmmaker who had been an intern for Rep. John Lewis and had worked for Rep. Hank Johnson, was completely unknown to voters (though not to Atlanta-area Democratic insiders). But an early endorsement by Lewis — an icon of the civil rights movement, the Democratic Party, and modern Atlanta — quickly boosted Ossoff’s national profile.

Potential rivals, such as lawyer Josh McLaurin and long-ago state Rep. Sally Harrell, ducked out of the contest. Other Democratic candidates, such as Clinton-era state Sen. Ron Slotin, soon found themselves shunted aside. On January 26, Daily Kos Elections announced that it was endorsing Ossoff. The money began to roll in. Within a month, the DCCC announced that it was sending nine field staffers to the district. An NRCC ad that memorably mocked Ossoff for dressing up as Han Solo as a college student only brought him more attention. The Planned Parenthood Action Fund backed Ossoff with digital ads, mail, and a field campaign.

In the end, Democrats solved their problem beautifully. Ossoff raised $8 million by the end of March. In the April 18 runoff, he received 48 percent of the vote; only 1 percent of voters backed the other Democrats. Ossoff managed to mobilize the Democratic base while running a campaign with broad appeal. (His ads are models of courting the median voter.)

While the conventional wisdom has long been that only extremist candidates can raise large sums from small donors, Ossoff courted his supporters not with ideology but with “Make Trump Furious.” The Daily Kos endorsement didn’t call for a socialist revolution. Instead, it focused on the most brass-tacks aspects of politics: Ossoff’s early fundraising success, his endorsements by Lewis and other Georgia Democrats, Trump’s relative weakness in the Sixth, and the need for Democrats to consolidate early behind one candidate.

Republican Party organizations could not get behind a particular candidate, and local GOP bigwigs quickly scattered their endorsements. As Ossoff gained strength, Republicans worried that he might win the primary without a runoff. Not only was he consolidating Democratic voters but Republican enthusiasm seemed low, and turnout could have easily disappointed.

As a result, the NRCC, the Georgia Republican Party, and the Congressional Leadership Fund entered the race, both on the air and on the ground. They sought to stimulate Republican turnout and drive up Ossoff’s negatives. These are both traditional roles for party committees and interest groups. The GOP organizations were also performing actions that the candidates on their own could not. The National Rifle Association also sponsored radio ads attacking Ossoff.

But other groups played roles less supportive of Republican Party goals. The Club for Growth, long active in Republican primaries, funded ads supporting former Johns Creek council member Bob Gray and trashing Republican frontrunner Handel. The 45 Committee and Ending Spending, two murky groups with ties to Ameritrade founder (and Republican megadonor) Joe Ricketts, sponsored ads supporting Handel and attacking both Gray and the Club for Growth. Gray was also attacked by a dark-money group called Americans United for Values, whose ultimate backers are unknown.

Groups backed by a small number of very wealthy individuals (or whose funders are unknown) pose different questions than do high-profile, mass-membership organizations like the NRA and Planned Parenthood. (Handel also benefited from the backing of right-to-life organizations, long a force in GOP primaries.)

The primary taught another lesson about the Republican Party: There is not much sign of a “Trump faction.” Businessman Bruce LeVell, who had been a member of Donald Trump’s diversity coalition and was endorsed by Trump sidekick Corey Lewandowski, received 0.24 percent of the vote. (Veteran Tea Party activist Amy Kremer performed even worse). Gray also associated himself with Trump (despite his backing by the sometimes Trump-skeptical Club for Growth) and performed much better, but still finished a distant second to Handel among Republicans.

So what are the lessons of this race? Well, that even in situations where there is no formal party endorsement, parties can solve coordination problems, as the Democrats did. Even if Ossoff does not ultimately win, his strong showing seems to be adding to rising Democratic morale nationwide. Democrats want to be competitive in suburban and Sunbelt districts similar to Georgia’s Sixth, and already top-tier candidates are jumping into those races. Party organizations can also provide collective goods when they are unable to back particular candidates, as the NRCC and the Georgia Republican Party did. Democrats are highly motivated to oppose Trump and all his works, while Republicans don’t seem particularly interested in backing Trumpish candidates.

The roles played by interest groups and other “party network” actors tell some complicated tales. While the surge of Democratic mobilization has exploded the ranks of local party activists, it has also fueled the growth of organizations outside the formal party, such as Indivisible. One could imagine how such groups could be problematic, given the GOP’s complicated history with the Tea Party. But Indivisible was created by former Democratic congressional staffers, and has seemed unwilling to embrace a systematic policy message beyond “resist Trump.” (In my perhaps-unrepresentative experience, many local Democratic activists are also involved in Indivisible chapters.)

Given that most Democratic officeholders seem happy to resist Trump as well, it’s perhaps not surprising that Indivisible has not yet spawned any primary challenges. Democratic activists seem mostly motivated by anti-Trump sentiment rather than purist crusading. Indeed, when Bernie Sanders refused to endorse the not-so-ideological Ossoff, the outcry was such that the senator quickly reversed himself.

The NRA and Planned Parenthood, two huge (and popular) issue groups with strong party ties, mostly stuck to actions that would help “their side” capture the Sixth. The Congressional Leadership Fund, under the control of the House GOP, followed the same path as other Republican organizations.

It’s hard to see why groups like the CLF shouldn’t be considered de facto party committees. It’s also true that it’s hard to see the justification for a campaign finance system that leads to odd workarounds like the CLF to accomplish ordinary party functions. The role of the Club for Growth is more troubling, given its heavy activity in Republican primaries on behalf of highly ideological candidates and its backing by a small number of wealthy donors. But the story of the Georgia Sixth was mostly of parties able to accomplish their goals under unusual conditions.