Tuesday, Sept. 4, 2012. Charlotte, N.C. The same tent served as the delegation’s new morning meeting location, and everyone was invited in—the press loudly and clearly, so all delegates could hear the invite.
These state morning meetings give the Party a chance to circulate big Democratic names and former Vermont governor Howard Dean visited for our first morning. The Oregon politicians who spoke were applauded politely— so funny to see men who normally dominate rooms acting merely as warm-up acts. But Rep. Suzanne Bonamici, the newest member of the Oregon delegation and its only woman, received a tremendous cheer.
Fired up, Governor Dean delivered a rousing speech to start the first convention day. These kinds of speeches, held all over Charlotte with each state delegation that morning, were like 50 separate state engines revving up.

I had to sneak out near the end of Dean’s remarks to meet a friend from Stanford who made the trip to Charlotte—Camille Fletcher, JD ’13. Though I knew the day would be long for me, I was certain it would be far longer for her, having just come from NYC. Though she had no official role, the Democratic convention pushed hard to include friends and guest of each delegation. I guess the summer job Camille had in Oregon after 1L year paid off after all.

I was relieved she joined me, as she could serve as my entry ticket into the first caucus meeting of the day, the Women’s Caucus. The Women’s Caucus went unchallenged by any other caucus or large event, and the room was packed with a crowd of women looking to turn this election into a landslide. The RNC presented a friendly face to women voters last week, but speaker after speaker at the caucus offered a contrasting picture.

Addressing debates about birth control and equal pay, Cecile Richard, head of Planned Parenthood, and daughter of the famous Texas governor Ann Richards, captured the mood of the room as she proclaimed that the older women in the room—the Menopausal Militia—could not believe that “they had to fight this shit all over again.”

The comments from Rep. Akins, the Missouri Senate candidate also received prominent mention and proved definitively, Richards explained, the need for better sexual education throughout the nation.
The next caucus meeting for the LGBT Caucus was held simultaneously with the Senior Council—an interesting contrast. The LGBT caucus room filled up so fast that the doors had to be secured and people turned away. Quite a difference from Tampa, where the RNC did not feature a single LGBT speaker during the entire convention.

Though Camille and I were shut out of the room, a bit of convention detective work—inspired by my dad, a former Oregon Democratic party chair who was an expert on navigating these type of events—led to the exit door in an adjacent conference room. Navigating the supply hallway behind the rooms, we were able to get into the LGBT Caucus through the room’s back door.

In a meeting full of inspirational speakers—Tammy Baldwin, a lesbian congresswoman running for Wisconsin Senate foremost among them—the most inspiring part came with the roll call of each state delegation’s LGBT delegate numbers. Over 500 stood up as their states and its LGBT delegates were called out.
Having had a brother kicked out of the Navy under DADT, I spent a bit of time talking to an Oregon reporter from Bend, Oregon who was seeking reactions to the event. I had quite a bit to say.

After a quick late lunch, we headed for the convention hall, passing senators and media personalities along the way. A convention will never cease to amaze you with the folks whose paths you cross.

Best of all for those of us who have spent too much time in late-night dorm room political debates is finding old college friends. I ran across an old Georgetown friend, who had gone into finance, sporting the badge “Honored Finance Committee Guest.” This made me wonder about that path not taken in life. But to each their own.

Impressively, we also passed a group marching in favor of the legalization of undocumented immigrants that had managed to position itself within earshot of the convention hall where they were staging a sit-in protest, surrounded by 200 police officers. Unlike the individual anti-choice protesters or four protestors against drone strikes who had held their signs silently, a large, loud protest only rarely made it within hearing range of delegates. The free speech issues involved with these events receive less attention than they perhaps deserve.

After an hours-long standoff, during which all the delegates passed by to the Time Warner Center for the official convention’s start, the protesters were allowed to march through empty streets.
People poured into an over-flowing Time Warner Center, where a great sorting of delegates and honored guests, elected officials and citizenry, and one state delegation from another took place. I said good-bye to Camille—though we kept meeting at the free iPhone recharging station, which must have been one of the most popular hangouts in the center.

Just as with bus routes, one can map a state’s electoral importance by its seating on the convention floor, and amusingly, one found both deep blue California and bright red Texas sharing space far back in the convention hall. Though not a swing state with front and center seating like Nevada and Virginia, nor a presidential home state like Illinois or Hawaii, Oregon scored pretty solid seats near the floor this election,, perhaps to make up for terrible seating in 2008.

The choice of a seat is critical in this situation. Sit too far down in an aisle, and the trips in and out during the seven hours of convention events become a tremendous pain in the butt. But sit too near the end of an aisle, and there is serious risk of a cameraman showing up and sticking a camera next to your head for an emotional profile shot while you listen to a powerful speech. I grabbed a seat by the Oregon placard, which was at the end of an aisle but physically blocked all but the most determined cameraman.

James Allen “Jake” Klonoski is a Navy veteran who served in Afghanistan, fought piracy off the coast of Somalia, and deployed in support of the 2011 conflict in Libya. He co-founded the Stanford Law Veterans Organization and is active with the American Constitution Society. He will graduate from Stanford Law School in 2013.