Iowa caucuses, America's kickoff presidential contest, started in the '70s

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DES MOINES, Iowa – New Hampshire has been holding it’s first-in-the-nation presidential primary for 100 years.

But Iowa’s a much more recent power player in the race for the White House.

2020 PRIMER: HOW THE IOWA CAUCUSES WORK

Political parties in the Hawkeye State have used caucuses to select candidates since the 19th century – but it wasn’t until 1972 that the state held the first contest in the presidential nominating calendar.

Here’s how it happened: After the violent protests at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, party leaders decided to spread out the nominating contest schedule in each state. Iowa – thanks to its long and complex nomination process – was the first state to hold a contest in the 1972 campaign. Four years later, the state also held the first Republican caucuses in the White House race.

And it was in that year that the Iowa caucuses grabbed the national spotlight.