ew Hampshire's voice commands attention for one reason above all others: The state speaks well because it listens well.
In a long campaign that lacked focus until last night, the people of New Hampshire patiently answered their phones (90 percent received a call from at least one campaign), opened their mail (90 percent received flyers), and trudged out to cookouts, house parties, and town meetings (25 percent personally met at least one candidate).
After weighing what they had heard, they went out yesterday and gave the nation a campaign.
Every four years, attempts are made to push the New Hampshire primary off its first-in-the-nation perch. The state is not demographically representative. It would be fairer to move the honor around. But the crucial point is that these people know what they're doing. They know how to question and make judgments about the candidates individually, while not being overly impressed with big spending or establishment backing.
This year, independent voters outnumbered registered Republicans for the first time, with Democrats running third. And they made themselves heard. While Senator John McCain beat Governor George W. Bush among Republicans, according to exit polls, his big margin - and former Senator Bill Bradley's surprising strength against Vice President Al Gore - were due to independents, many of them young voters.
The biggest winner yesterday was the New Hampshire primary itself, which proved once again that it performs well as the nation's ear.
Surely the candidates who did less well than they had hoped feel no great affection for the New Hampshire primary this morning, but they should not try to change it. Situations differ from year to year. Governor Bush's father lost a crippling New Hampshire primary to Ronald Reagan in 1980, but then beat Bob Dole there equally decisively in the 1988 primary.
New Hampshire deserves to be first.
