And Mattie Germer '03, who organized Harvard undergraduates for McCain, said Bush and Gore's nominations underscores the role "big money" plays in the election process.

"I think it is very discouraging that party bosses and party elites can coronate their chosen nominees and "persuade" the American public to validate their decisions," Germer wrote in an e-mail message. "I think that the large minority of voters who supported John McCain and Bill Bradley feel even more alienated from the political process than they did before."

Kennedy School Lecturer Martin A. Linsky said it is common in American politics for party nominations to seem preordained, however.

"There are very few insurgent candidacies that have ever been successful," Linsky said, giving John Anderson, Ross Perot and Teddy Roosevelt, Class of 1880, as examples. "Most of the examples cut the other way."

In Washington, President Clinton said Bradley's withdrawal reflected the differences between the two parties' contests.

"It recalled again how very much more substantive the debate was on the Democratic side on the issues and how much more agreement there was," Clinton said.

Bush and Gore, meanwhile, have already begun jousting in their race for the presidency.