Ulysses S. Grant served two terms in the White House and may have wanted to serve a third. However, his Republican Party adhered to the tradition of a two-term maximum, a precedent set by President George Washington, and nominated Rutherford B. Hayes of Ohio in 1876. The 1982 report by the National Commission on the Presidential Nominating Process, chaired by former Governor of Virginia A. Linwood Holton, Jr., tracked the variety of changes that have taken place in the nominating process.

The National Commission on the Presidential Nominating Process (1982)

Read the Commission's Final Report (Adobe Acrobat)

Chair:

A. Linwood Holton, Jr., Governor of Virginia, 1970-1974

Commissioners:

Dean Burch, Chairman, Federal Communications Commission, 1969-1974

William T. Coleman, Jr., U.S. Secretary of Transportation, 1975-1977 (Senior Counselor, O’Melveny & Myers)

William Frenzel, Member, U.S. House of Representatives from Minnesota, 1971-1991

Richard Gordon Hatcher, Mayor, Gary, Indiana, 1967-1987

Austin Ranney, American Enterprise Institute, Senior Staff, 1975-1985

Robert S. Strauss, U.S. Trade Representative, 1977-1979; U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union & Russian Federation, 1991 (Partner, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld)

Anne Wexler, Deputy Under Secretary of Commerce, 1977-1978; Assistant to the President 1978-1981

Commission Director:

Kenneth W. Thompson, Director of the Miller Center, 1978-1998