Introduction
A delegate is a person who is elected to represent other people. Delegates are intended to speak and act on behalf of the people who elected them, so that those people do not have to spend time speaking and acting for themselves, regarding political policy and its implementation in action.
The most common type of delegates are the members of the House of Representatives. These are elected officials who are determined by a state’s total population. The greater a state’s population, the more delegates they will have. However, all states must at least have one delegate in the House of Representatives, no matter how small their total population is.
A Senator is another type of delegate. Like members of the House of Representatives, Senators are elected officials who serve in the Senate of Congress. There are always two Senators per state, regardless of population size, and members of the Senate serve six year terms while members of the House of Representatives serve two year terms.
Delegates at the Democratic and Republican National Conventions are elected to support the presidential candidate whom they represent, during election years. However, they do not have to vote for the candidate they’ve been pledged to, though they should vote to “reflect the sentiments of those who elected them.”
To learn more about the number of delegates by state, scroll the charts.
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