In 1912, former President Teddy Roosevelt came out of retirement to seek the Republican nomination, and demanded that party bosses refrain from picking a candidate and instead hold the very first presidential primary elections. “Let the people rule,” he thundered. A century later, with a new campaign season upon us, our presidential primaries don’t seem to meet anyone’s standards for popular rule. Tiny, unrepresentative states have outsized power. Billionaires and their money are often the most important factors in the contests. Media coverage rewards extremist rhetoric and partisanship, and only a tiny fraction of American voters end up having a say in the presidential nomination process. What might have Roosevelt thought of today’s primaries? What reforms, if any, could return our primary elections to their original purpose? Geoffrey Cowan, president of the Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands and author of the new book Let the People Rule: Theodore Roosevelt and the Birth of the Presidential Primary, visits Zócalo to examine the past, present, and future of the peculiar way Americans pick our presidents.

 
 
Photo by Mallory Benedict/PBS NewsHour.