Published: March 01, 2008 10:48 pm      

Polls open Tuesday for primary election

PALESTINE — Anderson County residents and voters throughout Texas take to the polls Tuesday to cast their primary election ballots.

Polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday throughout the state.

In Anderson County, voters should vote at their usual polling place. There are 24 voting boxes spread throughout the county.

There are no countywide elections in either party’s primary, although Republicans in precinct 3 will be choosing their party’s nominee for both county commissioner and constable.

In the precinct 3 commissioner’s race on the Republican side, incumbent Ronny Smith of Frankston faces challengers Van Brown and Kenneth Dickson, with the ultimate victor advancing to the Nov. 4 general election where unopposed Democrat Rush Herrington awaits the winner.

Meanwhile, incumbent Kim Dickson takes on Ronnie Holcomb, an Anderson County sheriff’s deputy, for the Republican nomination for precinct 3 constable. Democrat Marvin Rogers, who does not have an opponent this spring, will face the eventual GOP winner in the fall.

In the District 8 state representative’s race which includes Anderson County, incumbent Byron Cook, R-Corsicana, faces Frost’s Bobby Vickery, the valedictorian of Neches High School Class of 1979, in the Republican Primary.

There are no Democratic candidates in the representative’s race.

District 8 also includes Navarro, Freestone and Limestone counties.

Texas voters will also go a long way Tuesday towards awarding their party’s delegates in the presidential race.

Texas has 228 Democratic and 140 Republican delgates which are awarded through Tuesday’s primary voting, caucuses and other ways.

Here is a brief look at how it works:

Democrats

A total of 126 pledged delegates are awarded proportionately based on primary voting in the 31 state senatorial districts. Each senate district’s delegate count is based on Democratic turnout there in the 2004 and 2006 general elections, so not every district has an equal number. The number of district delegates ranges from two to eight, about half have four.

Forty-two at-large pledged delegates are awarded based on caucuses beginning with precinct conventions on election night.

Using a math formula, delegates are awarded at the caucus according to a candidate’s share of supporters present. Those supporters may be selected to later attend county or senatorial district conventions and possibly the state convention in June.

At each level, the candidate with the most supporters in attendance benefits most.

Twenty-five pledged party and elected official delegates are named at the state convention, based on the percentage of presidential candidate support indicated when convention-goers sign in at the start of the meeting.

There are 35 unpledged delegates, 32 so-called superdelegates, including members of Congress and leading party officials, and three others the state chairman appoints.

Republicans

Texas Republicans will send 140 delegates to the national convention. Almost all are awarded based on primary voting. Each of the 32 congressional districts has three pledged delegates for a total of 96.

Texas is sometimes called a “winner-take-all” state, but there are some qualifiers.

A Republican candidate who receives more than 50 percent of the vote in a congressional district will receive all three delegates. But a first-place candidate receiving less than a majority but more than 20 percent will receive two delegates, with the second-place finisher getting one, provided he receives at least 20 percent of the vote. If he doesn’t, the first-place candidate receives all three delegates.

Forty-one pledged delegates are chosen at large based on the statewide primary vote. A candidate winning more than 50 percent receives all 41 at-large delegates. If no one wins more than 50 percent, the delegates are apportioned among all candidates getting at least 20 percent of the primary vote.

Three delegates in high-ranking party positions are unpledged. These are the state party chairman and two Texas members of the Republican National Committee.

The Republican Party holds precinct conventions election night to select who attends high-level conventions, but not to divide the number of delegates.

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Paul Stone may be contacted via e-mail at pstone@palestineherald.com

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The Associated Press contributed to this report.