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You're for Obama? I'm Gonna Lock the Door on You!Hillary's supporters carry the caucus in Eldora, Iowa.

By Emily BazelonPosted Thursday, Jan. 3, 2008, at 11:14 PM ET

Hillary Clinton By 6:45 at tonight's Democratic caucus in Eldora, Iowa, party precinct chairman Ed Bear is regretting that he didn't bring the PA system he uses as an auctioneer. Since the 1960s, when he first took on precinct duties, Bear has seen between three and 100 people show up to caucus. Tonight, there are 120 overflowing the folding chairs and tables in the cafeteria of Eldora's elementary school, out of fewer than 1,000 eligible Democratic voters. A school janitor helps swing one more long table out of the wall, where it was folded up like a Murphy bed.

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Bear closes the doors at 7 p.m. sharp, as the party has instructed him to, but announces that he doesn't like the rule that bars the door to latecomers and lets in a few straggler Obama supporters. Business begins with an attendance tally, done by hand based on sign-in sheets. The sheets include a bubble that voters can fill in to indicate their candidate preference, but almost no one does. They're keeping their precious votes close till the very end.

These Democrats come from half a dozen small towns in Hardin County, about an hour and a half northeast of Des Moines. (The Republicans are at the high school next door.) This is farming country: towns surrounded by miles of snowy fields broken up by the occasional windmill. Downtown Eldora has the proverbial single stoplight and a 19^th-century courthouse with a pretty brick clock tower. Some of the people caucusing work at the state training facility for juvenile delinquents. There's a doctor in scrubs and a carpenter in painter's pants and a stained white sweatshirt. And there are a lot of farmers. They raise corn, soybeans, cattle, and especially hogs, of which the county has a state-high 1.2 million. It also has a lot of retirees. I spot a lot of old faces and only one teenage one. (It belongs to 18-year-old Megan Thompson [Obama], who is here with her mother [Clinton.])

After quick figuring on a calculator, Bear, a blue-eyed 65-year-old who is a real-estate agent (the auctioneering business is a sideline), a Hardin County supervisor, and a church-going Baptist, announces that it will take 19 supporters for a candidacy to make it over the 15 percent threshold Iowa requires for "viability." The room goes suddenly silent. "I'm almost afraid to say this, but I need you folks to divide into your presidential preference groups," Bear says.

Clarence Lange, a retired farmer, breaks the tension with a shout. "Clinton, over here!" he calls. Earlier in the evening, he chided an undecided and younger friend, Paul Lawler. "When you age a little, you get to know how to make up your damn mind." Lawler keeps hedging: Since his original candidate, former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack, dropped out of the race, he has bounced around among the rest of the field. When the Clinton supporters move to stand and sit with Lange, Lawler heads away from them to the front of the room, where Bear is heading a small Bill Richardson group. Across the center aisle, Cindi Schossow, the Obama precinct captain, is gathering her comrades. The Edwards supporters take the back of the room.

After all these months and tender loving care from candidates, after all the money and ads, it takes about five minutes for the room to sort itself out. Pauline Lloyd and Terrie Harms, Clinton precinct captains, hand out signs, which several of their backers hold high. They look formidable, and it's quickly apparent that they have the biggest numbers.

But there's still work to be done: the courting of seven Richardson supporters and one retiree for Dodd. "It looks like we're in trouble," Bear tells his fellow Richardson people ruefully. The eight "nonviables" are up for grabs. And they matter mightily to the rest of the room, since Eldora's 14 delegates to the county convention (the second step in awarding the real statewide delegates) will be awarded proportionally.