Why does Iowa go first in elections?

This is a bit dated, but it may be of interest. http://publications.iowa.gov/135/1/elections/10-5....

So far as I can tell, this is a party rule (actually, both major parties have this rule), and not an actual law. New Hampshire traditionally held the first primary, and politicians in Iowa discovered that by holding an early caucus, they could attract a lot of money ($1,000,000/candidate) and greatly increase their influence by beating NH.

Other states tried to pull the same trick later, but Iowa politicians managed to get it into party rules that their state had to be first. If they hadn't put a stop to it, some states would probably be having their 2016 caucuses this month.

While the Democrats have tried to preserve the position of Iowa and New Hampshire in their nominating schedules, the Republicans have not. Alaska and Hawaii generally have their caucuses before Iowa, and in 1988 the Hawaii victory of Pat Robertson and the 1996 Louisiana victory of Pat Buchanan over Senator Phil Gramm had a significant impact on the results in Iowa. (This from Wikipedia).

because of the fact the Iowa caucuses are Thursday (basically the 1st conventional interior the country), they have a brilliant variety of impact and form of set the degree for something of the election season. for occasion, if one or 2 applicants finally end up to be clean winners or one candidate who grew to become into concept to be forward rather falls from the appropriate, it truthfully impacts electorate whilst they're waiting to vote of their primaries. some applicants may even back out of the presidential race in a number of those till now primaries in the event that they understand they are able to't earnings back any floor and that they are understanding of money besides. there's a phenomenon in elections that electorate do no longer choose for to vote for somebody that they think of ought to lose whether they sense strongly approximately that individual. So the winners in Iowa ought to impact different electorate and grow to be the winners in New Hampshire, etc.

New Hampshire is the first primary.

Iowa pot.