MELISSA BLOCK, host: Look out at the sea of delegates at the Republican and the Democratic conventions and you see two very different pictures of America.</s>MELISSA BLOCK, host: Last week in Denver, Democrats touted their gathering as the most diverse convention in party history. According to the Democrats, more than 44 percent of their delegates were minorities. That's an all-time high.</s>MELISSA BLOCK, host: More than 24 percent of the delegates were black, about 12 percent Hispanic. For the first time ever, women outnumbered men by a little bit.</s>MELISSA BLOCK, host: Now for the Republicans. The Republican National Committee doesn't release a breakdown of its delegates, so we're relying on other tabulations. According to the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, which compiles convention numbers, there are 36 black delegates to the Republican convention. That's 1.5 percent of the total - the lowest percentage in 40 years. And it's down from the all-time high of nearly 7 percent at the 2004 convention.</s>MELISSA BLOCK, host: According to a CBS-New York Times poll of Republican delegates, 5 percent are Hispanic. And as for the male-female split, that CBS-New York Times poll found that male delegates at the Republican convention outnumbered female delegates by more than two-to-one, 68 percent male, 32 percent female.</s>MELISSA BLOCK, host: Finally, in at least one way, the Democrats and Republicans are on par with each other. The median age of delegates in both parties is 54.
Last week, the Democrats touted their convention in Denver as the most diverse in the party's history. Meanwhile, at the Republican National Convention this week, the number of African-Americans is at its lowest point in 40 years.