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American politics has been shaped by an abundance of influential factors during its proud 00+ year history. War, taxation, suffrage, and racism have all dominated the American political climate. To represent the multifaceted nature of these and other topics, America has turned to political parties to help determine where they stand. Although the majority of Americans hold a rather "centrist" point of view, most have some bias, be it for either traditional or social reasons, for the conservative right or the liberal left. This bias for one faction or another is known as "partisanship."
As the year 1776 drew closer, the American colonies were, to say the least, divided. Each colony had been bred as an independent nation-state. Each had a separate economy, government, and citizens that felt loyal only to their individual colony. America needed common grievances to bind the nation together in resistance of imperial England. Grievances such as "taxation without representation" suddenly became mortal causes, thanks to the spurred enthusiasm from our founding fathers. This common fury laid the foundation for the argumentation that would come to define American government. For not only would that outrage bind the nation in war, but it would also provide a platform for the partisan, federalist/anti-federalist debate on what policy would replace the previous injustice.
In the later years of the Articles of Confederation there was much agitation for a stronger federal union, which was crowned with success when the Constitutional Convention drew up the Constitution of the United States. The men who favored the strong union and who fought for the adoption of the Constitution by the various states were called Federalists, a term made famous in that meaning by the Federalist Papers of Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay.
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After the Constitution was adopted and the new government was established under the presidency of George Washington, political division appeared within the cabinet, the opposing groups being headed by Alexander Hamilton and by Thomas Jefferson. The party that emerged to champion Hamiltons views was the Federalist party. Its opponents, at first called Anti-Federalists, drew together into a Jeffersonian party; first called the Republicans and later the Democratic Republicans, they eventually became known as the Democratic party. Party politics had not yet crystallized when John Adams was elected President, but the choice of Adams was, nevertheless, a modest Federalist victory.
The Federalists were conservatives; they favored a strong centralized government, encouragement of industries, attention to the needs of the great merchants and landowners, and establishment of a well-ordered society. In foreign affairs they were pro-British, while the Jeffersonians were pro-French. The members of the Federalist party were mostly wealthy merchants, big property owners in the North, and conservative small farmers and businessmen. Geographically, they were concentrated in New England, with a strong element in the Middle Atlantic states.
Opposition to war brought the Federalists the support of Clinton and many others, and the party made a good showing in the election of 181, winning New England (except for radical Vermont), New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and part of Maryland. They failed, however, in Pennsylvania and lost the election. While the country was at war, the disgruntled merchants of New England, represented by the Essex Junto, contemplated secession and called the Hartford Convention. Thus, paradoxically the Federalists became the champions of states rights.
The successful issue of the war ruined the party, which became firmly and solely the party of New England conservatives. The so-called era of good feelings followed, and politics became a matter of internal strife within the Democratic party. The Federalist party did not even offer a presidential candidate in 180, and by the election of 184 it was virtually dead.
As the Federalist party waned, politics came to consist mainly of feuds within the Democratic Republican organization, such as the opposition of the Quids to Madisons election and the peace ticket led by De Witt Clinton. By 180 the party dominated the nation so completely that Monroe was reelected without opposition. But the foundations for political regrouping were being laid.
In 184 the electoral vote was split between Andrew Jackson, John Quincy Adams, William H. Crawford, and Henry Clay, when the election went into the House of Representatives, Clay threw his support to Adams, who won. Jackson was elected in 188 and in 18 (when his followers held the first national convention of the Democratic party). In the debates of his administrations, especially over his dissolution of the Bank of the United States and the nullification controversy, opposition ultimately coalesced in the Whig party.
Until 1860 the Democrats won all the presidential elections except those of 1840 and 1848. During this period, political debate centered more and more on the bitter question of slavery that was dividing North and South. With the demise of the Whig party in the election of 185 and the emergence of the sectional, antislavery Republican party in 1854, the Democrats remained the sole national party.
The vital question of the decade between 1850 and 1860, concerned slavery in the territories, and on this issue the Democratic party divided sharply. One group, mainly Northern, led by Stephen A. Douglas, championed the doctrine of popular sovereignty, which held that the inhabitants of the territory should decide whether it would be slave or free. Other Northern Democrats swung over to the new antislavery parties. Southern Democrats, led by Robert Toombs and Jefferson Davis among others, and buttressed by the Supreme Courts decision in the Dred Scott Case, held that slavery must be protected in the territories. At the Democratic Convention of 1860 the party split, Northern Democrats nominating Douglas, and the Southern Democrats choosing John C. Breckinridge, thus facilitating the victory of Abraham Lincoln.
The Democrats regained the presidency in 11 under Woodrow Wilson, but only because the candidacy of Theodore Roosevelt on the Progressive party ticket diminished the Republican vote. Under Wilsons progressive policy, known as the New Freedom, some fruitful reform was enacted, but the idealism he had inspired waned after World War I. Democratic presidential candidates were defeated in the next three elections, but in 18 urban Democrats made key inroads into important urban voting blocs.
The economic depression that began in 1 helped to sweep the Democrats and Franklin Delano Roosevelt into office in 1, and with his New Deal the Democrats were again identified as the party of reform. Roosevelt was reelected in 16 with the largest plurality in the nations history, and in 140 he became the first U.S. President to be elected to a third term. After leading the country for three years in World War II, he was reelected for a fourth term in 144.
Upon his death (Apr., 145) he was succeeded by Harry S Truman. In 148, despite the withdrawal from the Democratic convention of many Southern Democrats (whose subsequent nominee was J. Strom Thurmond) and despite the candidacy of Henry A. Wallace, Truman narrowly defeated the Republican candidate, Thomas E. Dewey. Adlai E. Stevenson, the Democratic nominee in 15 and 156 was easily defeated by Dwight D. Eisenhower.
In 160, John F. Kennedy narrowly defeated the Republican candidate, Richard M. Nixon, in the presidential race. Upon Kennedys assassination, Lyndon B. Johnson became president and won a landslide victory in 164 against the conservative Republican Barry Goldwater. His administration was marked by much social welfare and civil-rights legislation but the conduct of the Vietnam War split the party, and when combined with the strong third-party showing of the conservative Southern Democrat George C. Wallace, led to the defeat of Hubert H. Humphrey by Richard Nixon in 168.
The Democratic party of the 170s and 80s was an uneasy alliance among labor, urban, and ethnic minority groups, intellectuals and middle-class reformers, and increasingly disaffected Southern Democrats. In 17 the balance in the party was further upset with the nomination of George McGovern, whose defense and social welfare views proved unacceptable to many labor unions and other groups, while the South continued to swing its support to national Republican candidates. Although the Democrats retained their solid majorities in Congress (except for the Senate in 180, 18, and 184), the victorious national coalition built by Nixon was sustained by Ronald Reagan in 180 and 184 and by George Bush in 188. Jimmy Carter, a Democrat from Georgia, may have won in 176 because of the political scandals that emerged during the second Nixon administration and by temporarily recalling Southern Democratic voters to the fold.
The Democratic victory of Bill Clinton in 1 was thought by some to have marked the emergence of a new Democratic coalition of labor, women, minorities, moderates, "Reagan Democrats," and the South. In 14, however, voters expressed their anti-Washington and anti-incumbent sentiments by delivering Republican victories nationwide, with a particularly strong showing in the South, resulting in the loss for the Democrats of their majorities in both houses of Congress as well as the loss of a number of governorships. Clintons conflicts with the Republican House helped restore much of the stature he had lost in 14, and with a generally healthy national economy in 16 he handily defeated Republican Bob Dole and Reform party candidate Ross Perot. Other incumbents, however, also benefited from the voters general contentment, and Republicans retained control of the House of Representatives and the Senate. This situation was largely unchanged by the 18 congressional elections despite the Lewinsky scandal, which Democrats feared would benefit Republicans.
However, during much of the above described, the Republican party was busy making history of its own. In 180, the conservative Ronald Reagan, a former supporter of Barry Goldwater, regained the presidency for the Republicans and reversed long-standing political trends by instituting a supply-side economic program of budget and tax cuts. He also advocated increased military spending and presided over the largest military buildup during peacetime in American history. The Iran-contra affair, which broke in late 186, marred the last years of his tenure, though his vice-president, George Bush, was nonetheless able to defeat the Democratic nominee, Michael Dukakis, in the 188 election.
Bush was generally recognized as strong on foreign policy. He was widely lauded for his role in orchestrating the coalition of forces against Iraq in the Persian Gulf War. He also largely continued Reagans policy toward the Soviet Union. On the domestic side, however, Bushs administration was perceived as being slow to respond to such problems as stagnant economic growth, rising unemployment, and the unaffordability of health care for many Americans. Bushs high popularity after the Persian Gulf War dropped rapidly, and he lost the 1 presidential election to the Democrat, Arkansass Governor Bill Clinton.
In the 14 congressional and state elections, however, the Republican party scored major victories and increased its hold in the South. Republicans unseated long-time Democratic incumbents, winning control of both houses of Congress (for the first time since the 150s) and claiming several governorships. Newt Gingrich, who spearheaded the Republicans congressional election campaign with his conservative "Contract with America" program, became speaker of the House. While bills were passed on the key program components, many items were thwarted or defeated in Congress or by the president.
The 16 elections saw incumbents generally retain their offices. Former Senate majority leader Bob Dole won the Republican nomination for the presidency, but he and his running mate, Jack Kemp, were never able to reduce significantly President Clintons substantial lead. In the House and Senate, Republicans retained their majorities, slightly diminished in the former and slightly increased in the latter. The 18 mid-term elections saw the Republican margin in the House reduced, despite expectations that they would benefit from the effects of the Lewinsky scandal; the results led to Gingrichs resignation from office.
Although Republicans and Democrats make up the two major American parties, there are numerous other "rd parties." The largest of these is the Libertarian party. Although not widely accepted, the party is rising in popularity, and might someday prove to be a major contender. The party is neither too far left or right. This centrist viewpoint might be attractive to the majority of Americans, who have steadily less and less party loyalty, and more centrist votes than ever before. Libertarians believe the answer to Americas political problems is the same commitment to freedom that earned America its greatness a free-market economy and the abundance and prosperity it brings; a dedication to civil liberties and personal freedom that marks this country above all others; and a foreign policy of non-intervention, peace, and free trade as prescribed by Americas founders.
Obviously, the political party system America has had since birth has taken many twists and turns. Many believe American politics can be made clearer and easier to understand with the help of parties. Others, such as President George Washington, believed that it would be the downfall of the fledgling nation he helped to found. For better or worse, they have created a complicated yet fair and just political system that has resulted in a great and mighty nation.
U.S. History. Encarta. CD-ROM. Seattle Microsoft, 1.
Parties. Modern Marvels. History Channel. A&E Television Networks, Atlanta. 08 Dec. 00.
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