General Election Article Index for
General
Articles about
General Election
Website Links For
General
 

Information About

General Election




A general election is an Election in which all members of a given political body are up for election. The term is usually used to refer to elections held for a nation's primary legislative body, as distinguished from By-election s and Local Election s.

The term originates in the United Kingdom General Elections for the House Of Commons .


LIST OF GENERAL ELECTIONS




A general election is also a term used in opposition to ''' Primary Election '''. In the United States , primary elections serve to narrow down a field of candidates, and general elections actually elect candidates to offices. The general election is usually held on Election Day , the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November .

It meets the above definition of "general election" in that the entire United States House Of Representatives is elected on Election Day, though not the entire United States Congress . Prior to the 17th Amendment , members of the United States Senate were not directly elected by the people but rather by their state legislature. Though Senators have been directly elected since then, only one-third of them are up for election on any given Election Day.


SEE ALSO