Favorite son

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For other uses, see Favorite Son.

A favorite son (or a favorite daughter) is a political term that can refer to two different types of politicians:

A politician whose electoral appeal derives from his or her regional appeal, rather than his or her political views. For example, in the United States, presidential candidates usually win the support of their home states fairly easily.
A member of a political party who is favored by the party leadership to assume a prominent role; for example: Paul Martin while Jean Chrétien was Prime Minister, in Canada; Gordon Brown while Tony Blair was Prime Minister, in United Kingdom.

In U.S. politics, nominating favorite sons was also used as a technique to send uncommitted state delegations to a national convention of the Democratic or Republican Party. The delegates would be nominally committed to a popular or well-known governor or senator who was not a serious candidate. At some point during the convention, the favorite son would withdraw, freeing his delegates to support another candidate. The technique allowed senior leaders from the state to negotiate with candidates for preferential treatment.

The technique was widely used in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Since nationwide campaigns by candidates and binding primary elections have replaced brokered conventions since the mid-20th century, the favorite son technique of winning delegates' votes has fallen out of use.

Section 1 of Article Two of the United States Constitution requires an elector to the Electoral College to vote for two candidates for president (and later by the Twelfth Amendment, a president and a vice president), at least one of whom must be from a different state than the elector. This requirement was added to prevent electors from voting only for their favorite sons in presidential elections.