Political Parties
- Parties here and abroad
- Decentralization
- A party is a group that seeks to elect candidates to public office by supplying them with a label.
- Arenas
- A label in the minds of the voters
- Set of leaders in government
- Organization recruiting and campaigning
- American parties have become weaker in all three arenas
- As labels: more independents
- As organizations: much weaker since the 1960s
- As sets of leaders: the organization of Congress less under their control
- Reasons for differences from European parties
- Federal system decentralizes power
- Early on, most people with political jobs worked for state and local government.
- National parties were coalitions of local parties.
- As political power becomes more centralized, parties become weaker still
- Parties closely regulated by state and federal laws
- Candidates chosen through primaries, not by party leaders
- President elected separately from Congress
- Political culture
- Parties unimportant in life; Americans do not join or pay dues
- Parties separate from other aspects of life
- Federal system decentralizes power
- Decentralization
- The rise and decline of the political party
- The Founding (to the 1820s)
- Founders' dislike of factions
- Emergence of Republicans, Federalists: Jefferson versus Hamilton
- Loose caucuses of political notables
- Republicans' success and Federalists' demise
- No representation of clear economic interests
- The Jacksonians (to the Civil War)
- Political participation a mass phenomenon
- More voters to reach
- Party built from the bottom up
- Abandonment of presidential caucuses
- Beginning of national conventions to allow local control
- Political participation a mass phenomenon
- The Civil War and sectionalism
- Jacksonian system unable to survive slavery issue
- New Republicans become dominant because of
- Civil War and Republicans on Union side
- Bryan's alienation of northern Democrats in 1896
- In most states one party predominates
- Party professionals, or "stalwarts," one faction in GOP
- Mugwumps, Progressives, or "reformers" another faction
- Balance of power at first
- Diminished role later
- The era of reform
- Progressive push measures to curtail parties
- Primary elections
- Nonpartisan elections
- No party-business alliances
- Strict voter registration requirements
- Civil service reform
- Initiative and referendum elections
- Effects
- Reduction in worst forms of political corruption
- Weakening of all political parties
- Progressive push measures to curtail parties
- The Founding (to the 1820s)
- Party realignments
- Definition: sharp, lasting shift in the popular coalition supporting one or both parties
- Occurrences: change in issues
- ) 1800: Jeffersonians defeated Federalists
- ) 1828: Jacksonian Democrats came to power
- ) 1860: Whigs collapsed; Republicans won
- ) 1896: Republicans defeated Bryan
- ) 1932: FDR Democrats came to power
- Kinds of realignments
- ) Major party disappears and is replaced (1800, 1860)
- ) Voters shift from one party to another (1896, 1932)
- Clearest cases
- ) 1860: slavery
- ) 1896: economics
- ) 1932: depression
- 1980 not a realignment
- ) Expressed dissatisfaction with Carter
- ) Also left Congress Democratic
- 1972-1988: shift in presidential voting patterns in the South
- ) Fewer Democrats, more Republicans, more independents
- ) Independents vote Republican
- ) Now close to fifty-fifty Democratic, Republican
- ) Party dealignment, not realignment
- Party decline; evidence for it
- Fewer people identify with either party
- Increase in ticket splitting
- The national party structure today
- Parties similar on paper
- National convention ultimate power; nominates presidential candidate
- National committee composed of delegates from states
- Congressional campaign committees
- National chair manages daily work
- Party structure diverges in the late 1960s
- RNC moves to bureaucratic structure; a well-financed party devoted to electing its candidates
- Democrats move to factionalized structure to distribute power
- RNC uses computerized mailing lists to raise money
- Money used to run political consulting firm
- Democrats still manage to outspend GOP
- Public opinion polls used to find issues and to get voter response to issues and candidates
- RNC now tries to help state and local organizations
- Democrats remain a collection of feuding factions
- National conventions
- National committee sets time and place; issues call setting number of delegates for each state
- Formulas used to allocate delegates
- Democrats shift the formula away from the South to the North and West
- Republicans shift the formula away from the East to the South and Southwest
- Result: Democrats move left, Republicans right
- Democratic formula rewards large states and Republican-loyal states
- Democrats set new rules
- In the 1970s the rules changed to weaken party leaders and increase the influence of special interests.
- Hunt commission in 1981 reverses 1970s rules by increasing the influence of elected officials and by making convention more deliberative
- Consequence of reforms: parties represent different set of upper-middle-class voters
- Republicans represent traditional middle class
- Democrats represent the "new class"
- Democrats hurt because the traditional middle class closer in opinions to most citizens
- To become more competitive, Democrats adopt rule changes
- In 1988 the number of superdelegates increased and special interests decreased.
- In 1992 three rules: winner-reward system, proportional representation, and states that violate rules are penalized
- Conventions today only ratify choices made in primaries.
- Parties similar on paper
- State and local parties
- The machine
- Recruitment via tangible incentives
- High degree of leadership control
- Abuses
- Gradually controlled by reforms
- But machines continued
- Both self-serving and public regarding
- Winning above all else
- Ideological parties
- Principle above all else
- Usually outside Democrats and Republicans
- But some local reform clubs
- Reform clubs replaced by social movements
- Solidary groups
- Most common form of party organization
- Members motivated by solidary incentives
- Advantage: neither corrupt nor inflexible
- Disadvantage: not very hard working
- Sponsored parties
- Created or sustained by another organization
- Example: Detroit Democrats controlled by UAW
- Not very common
- Personal following
- Examples: Kennedys, Curley, Talmadges, Longs
- Viability today affected by TV and radio
- Advantage: vote for the person
- Disadvantage: takes time to know the person
- The machine
- The two-party system
- Rarity among nations today
- Evenly balanced nationally, not locally
- Why such a permanent feature?
- Electoral system: winner-take-all and plurality system
- Opinions of voters: two broad coalitions
VII. Minor parties
- Ideological parties: comprehensive, radical view; most enduring
Examples: Socialist, Communist, Libertarian - One-issue parties: address one concern, avoid others
Examples: Free Soil, Know-Nothing, Prohibition - Economic protest parties: regional, oppose depressions
Examples: Greenback, Populist - Factional parties: from split in a major party
Examples: Bull Moose, Henry Wallace, American Independent - Movements not producing parties; either slim chance of success or major parties accommodate
Examples: civil rights, antiwar, labor - Factional parties have had greatest influence
- Nominating a president
- Two contrary forces: party's desire to win motivates it to seek an appealing candidate, but its desire to keep dissidents in party forces a compromise to more extreme views
- Are the delegates representative of the voters?
- Democratic delegates much more liberal
- Republican delegates much more conservative
- Explanation of this disparity not quota rules: quota groups have greater diversity of opinion than do the delegates
- Who votes in primaries?
- Primaries now more numerous and more decisive
- Stevenson and Humphrey never entered a primary
- By 1992: forty primaries and twenty caucuses
- Little ideological difference between primary voters and rank-and-file party voters
- Caucus: meeting of party followers at which delegates are picked
- Only most-dedicated partisans attend
- Often choose most ideological candidate: Jackson, Robertson in 1988
- Primaries now more numerous and more decisive
- Who are the new delegates?
- However chosen, today's delegates a new breed unlikely to resemble average citizen: issue-oriented activists
- Advantages of new system
- Increased chance for activists within party
- Decreased probability of their bolting the party
- Disadvantage: may nominate presidential candidates unacceptable to voters or rank and file
- Parties versus voters
- Democrats: win congressional elections but lose presidential contests
- Candidates are out of step with average voters on social and tax issues
- So are delegates, and there's a connection
- Republicans had the same problem with Goldwater (1964)
- Rank-and-file Democrats and Republicans differ on many political issues, but the differences are usually small
- Delegates from two parties differ widely on these same issues
- 1996 conventions
- Few conservatives at Democratic convention
- Few liberals at Republican convention
- Formula for winning president
- Nominate candidates with views closer to the average citizen (e.g., 1996 election)
- Fight campaign over issues agreed on by delegates and voters (e.g., 1992 election)
- 1996 conventions
- Democrats: win congressional elections but lose presidential contests