The Road to National Delegate – by Janice Schwarz
I had been planning to run for National Delegate for around two years or more. My friend and 2004 National Delegate, Anthony Pace encouraged me and guided me as to what would be important to get elected. Although I was already very active in Democratic activities, I took on additional responsibilities when the opportunities arose. By the time of the primary, my political resume was full with leadership positions.
The true campaigning for the National Delegate seats began after the Senatorial Convention. I started receiving e-mails and post cards from my competitors. The excitement of Clinton-Obama race had brought out new Democratic activists. There were many more people interested in running for National Delegate than ever before. Often, when I looked at the competition, I thought that maybe this was too much, and I would never make it. Besides, I was working very hard for Carol Kent as her field director and it was another distraction from the time that I could devote to that race. But I also thought, if not now, when?
I waited until the week before State Convention before sending out my one piece of collateral. I did not want the competition to see what I did before hand and try to copy it. Unlike any other piece of literature that I saw, mine had testimonials from other prominent local Democrats. Also, I threw in a picture of my family – I have cute kids and a good looking husband and thought – let’s use this to my advantage! I also created a label that I could wear and hand out to my supporters. Since SD 8 was primarily in Collin County, I started attending the Collin County TDW meetings. I attended a meeting for SD Clinton Delegates (and made my first speech on the fly). I went to the SD 8 Delegate Organizational meeting (I spoke about North Dallas Democrats HD 102), and then it was onto a Wine tasting in Plano for SD 8 Delegates (my second speech). When opportunities arose, I was out there.
I knew that State Convention would be the most critical part of the campaign. Thursday night I made it to the opening reception, attended Royce West’s party and went on the pub crawl afterwards. Friday early afternoon, Harriet Miller (our founder and my roommate) and I checked in, and we worked on my speech. An important issue for many Clinton delegates was healthcare, since that was an area where Clinton and Obama had different platforms. I knew it would be important to differentiate myself from the other candidates; therefore I included mentioning that both my husband and I are cancer survivors. It isn’t something that I generally talk about, but I thought it was pertinent and something that made my concern with people having access to health insurance more real. Harriet helped me with my focus and made the speech the best it could be. We practiced over and over and got it under the 60 second requirement.
My boss told me “If you are running as a Hillary Clinton delegate, you need to wear a pants suit”. Therefore towards the end of the General Session (around 9PM) I went back to my room before the vote and put on a nice pants suit. SD 8 had to reconvene since we did not have the opportunity to finish our business. I took my flyers, recruited Harriet and Anthony to campaign for me and went up to all of the Clinton delegates one last time and asked for their vote. All the experience I had from canvassing for Martin Frost and Harriet Miller was put to use for my own campaign. If they said they would support me, I asked them to wear one of my stickers. As I kept handing out stickers, a realization came over me – I’m going to be one of the top candidates. When people said that they already had a candidate, I asked them if there was a runoff would they consider me. And they would say yes and took my brochure.
When it was time to make our speeches, ten women (24 had put in applications) came forward to run for the one Clinton delegate spot. I went last – a suggestion from Carol Kent. We had no microphone or megaphone and I shouted my speech so that everyone could hear. The first vote was taken and Jeanne Rubin from Collin County and I were the top vote getters. I’m pretty sure that Jeanne had more votes, but she needed a majority to win. Then we went into a second vote. It was too close to call. The decision was made to line up behind each candidate. We had counters on each side of us and the vote was 47 to 47. Sue Mottinger, the Clinton SD 8 coordinator asked for two quarters. Jeanne took the opportunity to pick the quarter and I got to call it. My instinct said tails and it was tails! I could only say “Oh My God!” I was shaking and started to cry since I was in such a state of shock and amazement. I had never won an election in my life. My friends on the Clinton side came around and hugged and congratulated me. I was lucky to have good friends such as Lenna Webb (we promised to support the other should one get into the runoff) and Bob Franklin on my side. Plus Bob’s campaign snacks helped me through as I started to get the shakes prior to my speech.
I am thrilled and proud to represent SD 8 in Denver. I will be blogging from the Convention –janiceschwarz.blogspot.com. I will send pictures and video (I’m going to buy a mini camcorder to take with me). Wish me luck in Denver!
