Reuters

YOU know the race for the presidency is truly under way when Rudolph Giuliani, a former mayor of New York and an urbanite to the bone, spends half a day hanging out at a California farm show. During the next 12 months—longer, if he wins the Republican nomination—Mr Giuliani will become accustomed to the sight of tractors and feed wagons. If California's politicians get their wish, he will also spend a lot more time in their state.

California punches well below its weight in presidential election campaigns. Candidates tend to fly in for fund-raising dinners and then fly back to Iowa and New Hampshire, where the real campaigning takes place. Those states are usually the first to select Democratic and Republican nominees; California is near the end of the race. Nor does the state see much action during the final run-off in November. California is so reliably Democratic that its votes are taken for granted. Because it is three hours behind the east coast, national TV stations have even announced likely winners before its polls have closed.

That rankles in a state that likes to think of itself as a beacon to the rest of America. Why, Californians ask, should Iowa (which is 95% white) and New Hampshire (96% white) hold so much sway over an increasingly diverse country? So, this week the state Senate approved a bill moving California's primary to February 5th. It should pass in the Assembly next week and the governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, has said he will sign it.

Although three other states are certain to vote earlier (four, on the Democratic side) Californians outnumber them more than three to one. The hope is that, once the bill is signed into law, the state will be transformed from a mere cash machine to a political gorilla. For several reasons, that is unlikely; but the state's move will nonetheless transform the presidential race.

California is not the only state that wants to hold an election in early February. As many as 17 may now pile in on the same day, including big ones such as Florida, Illinois, Michigan and New Jersey. Assuming that none of those states pushes its primary even further forward, into January—something that has been mooted in Florida—February 5th will become in effect a national referendum.

The national Democratic and Republican parties are not pleased. They have tried to bribe states by promising them more delegates (and thus a bigger say in the nomination process) if they hold their elections later, and have threatened to deprive them of delegates if they insist on moving. Such threats ring hollow. It is not the number of delegates that matters so much as the media attention generated by early races. And the national parties will not want to annoy voters by telling them that their ballots do not count for much.

The most obvious effect of holding so many elections on one day is to raise the cost of competing. California alone, where races must be fought mostly with TV ads, is dauntingly expensive. Wayne Johnson, a Republican consultant, says candidates running for statewide offices last year reckoned on spending about $3m a week on media advertising alone. The “entrance fee” for a Republican who wants to run a campaign in the state next year is thought to be at least $10m. Democrats, who need to woo voters in the exceptionally pricey Los Angeles and San Francisco media markets, will have to spend even more.

The cost, combined with the sheer number of races to be decided on the same day, is likely to winnow the field. Nine Democrats and ten Republicans have announced that they will run in 2008, or have set up exploratory committees. Few will be able even to contest the election on February 5th. Commentators were disappointed when, in 2000, both parties in effect settled on their candidates during the second week of March. Next year's race may be over more than a month earlier.

Some candidates can take comfort at the thought of the Californian gorilla. Mr Giuliani's laissez-faire record on abortion and his relaxed attitude to homosexuality are likely to offend many Iowans and South Carolinians. But he can count on California's Republican voters being less fussed about such imperfections, so long as he preaches the gospel of low taxes. And if he is still running strongly by that point, Mr Giuliani may also be able to call on the support of Mr Schwarzenegger, a fellow centrist and man of action (see article). An early California primary may also suit both the current Democratic front-runners. Hillary Clinton benefits from the assiduous networking of her husband, who visited the state, on average, once every seven weeks during his first term as president. Barack Obama is sparking fascination in Hollywood, which knows how to spot a star with a convincing back-story. Moguls from the film and music industries will host a fund-raising dinner for him next week.

None of the candidates, though, is likely to make the mistake of thinking they can wholly fall back on California's voters. New Hampshire, Iowa, Nevada and South Carolina will still generate most of the political headlines for several weeks at a crucial early stage of the campaign. Survival in those states still matters, not just the ability to pay for TV advertisements in Los Angeles. In 2004 Howard Dean entered the primaries with a bigger war-chest than any other Democratic candidate. A poor showing in Iowa, combined with an infamous scream, sank his campaign almost immediately.

“The states that go first will get the same kind of pandering that they always do,” predicts Larry Sabato, who follows primary elections at the University of Virginia. And California's decision to bring its primary forward might even increase their influence. The probable crush of elections on February 5th means candidates will be stretched thin and will find it almost impossible to spend much time in any state. So, paradoxically, it may now become even more important to establish a reputation as a winner beforehand. Iowa and New Hampshire are not doomed to obscurity quite yet.