POLITICAL PARTIES
Chapter 12
O’Connor and Sabato
American Government:
Continuity and Change
POLITICAL PARTIES
In this chapter we will cover…
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What is a Political Party?
The Evolution of American Party Democracy
The Roles of American Parties
One-Partyism and Third-Partyism
The Basic Structure of American Political Parties
The Party in Government
The Party-In-The-Electorate
What is a Political Party?
A political party is a group of
voters, activists, candidates, and
office holders who identify with
a party label and seek to elect
individuals to public office.
The Evolution of American
Party Democracy
• Hamilton and Jefferson, as heads of the
Federalist and Anti-Federalist groups
respectively, are often considered
'fathers' of the modern party system.
• By 1800, this country had a party
system with two major parties that has
remained relatively stable ever since.
Democrats and Republicans:
The Golden Age to Today
• From the presidential elections of 1860 to the
present, the same two major parties have
contested elections in the United States:
Democrats and Republicans.
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Reconstruction -- Republican dominance
1876-1896 -- closely competitive
1896-1929 -- Republican dominance
1930s and 1940s -- Democratic dominance
1950s and 1960s -- closely competitive
1970-present -- neither party dominant
The Golden Age (The Gilded Age)
• Political Machine: A party organization
that recruits voter loyalty with tangible
incentives and is characterized by a high
degree of control over member activity.
What did political machines offer?
• Party machines and government seemed to
be the same thing to many city dwellers.
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Provided jobs
Housing
Food
Entertainment
Community events
Immigrant support
Upward social mobility
• 75% Voter Turnout!!!
History Replace Political Machines
• Government conducts elections and
primaries
– Primary: The means by which a political party
nominates candidates for public office.
• New Deal provides social welfare programs
• 1900s Wave of Immigration slows down
• Post WWII – Growth of Suburbia
The Modern Era
• Direct Primary: The selection of party
candidates through the ballots of qualified
voters rather than at party nominating
conventions.
• Civil Service Laws: These acts removed the
staffing of the bureaucracy from political parties
and created a professional bureaucracy.
Post WWII
• Candidate-Centered Politics: Politics that
focuses directly on the candidates, their
particular issues, and character, rather than on
party affiliation.
• Issue-Oriented Politics: Politics that focuses on
specific issues rather than on party, candidate, or
other loyalties.
• Ticket-split: To vote for candidates of different
parties for various offices in the same election.
How do Parties Change?
• Party realignment: a shifting of party
coalition groupings in the electorate that
remains in place for several elections.
• Critical election: An election that signals a
party realignment through voter polarization
around new issues.
• Secular realignment: The gradual
rearrangement of party coalitions based
more on demographic shifts than on shocks
to the political system.
The Roles of American Parties
• The two party system has been used to
resolve political and social conflicts.
– Mobilizing Support and Gathering Power
– A Force for Stability
– Unity, Linkage, Accountability
– The Electioneering Function
– Party as a Voting and Issue Cue
– Policy Formulation and Promotion
Mobilizing Support and
Gathering Power
• Coalition: A group made up of interests or
organizations that join forces for the
purpose of electing public officials.
• Get Out the Vote: Voter registration drives.
Mobilizing previously unmotivated voters
to participate. May not be effective in
mobilizing “undecided” Americans.
A Force for Stability and
Moderation
• Continuity
• Tame extreme elements
– New Deal: Brought together African Americans
and southern whites.
– Increasing polarization diminished moderating
effect of parties.
• Government shut-down, GOP struggles with Tea
Party.
Unity, Linkage, and
Accountability
• Linkage between executive and legislative
branches
– Moderates separation of power
• Links National and State governments
• Links House to Senate
• Accountability between candidates and
voters
The Electioneering Function
• Candidate recruitment
• Election positions become government
positions
• Sustain the competitive function of
elections
Party as a Voting and Issue Cue
• Filter information – political ideology
• Shortcut for voting decisions
– Uninformed voters
• Reinforce the “compass” element of
political ideology
Policy Formulation and
Promotion
• National party platform: A statement of
the general and specific policy goals of a
political party, usually promulgated at the
national convention.
– describes the key differences between the two
major parties.
– 2/3 of winning platform becomes (at least
partly) government policy
– ½ of losing platform is also adopted –
bipartisanship (suggests limits on voter choice)
Minor Parties: Third-Partyism
• Minor parties are not a threat to the two major
parties.
• Only eight third parties have won any electoral
votes in a presidential contest.
• The third parties that have had some success are:
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1996 and 1992: Ross Perot’s Reform Party
1968: George Wallace’s American Independent Party
1924: Robert LaFollette’s Progressive Party
1912: Teddy Roosevelt’s Bull Moose Party
1856: Millard Fillmore's American Party
Obstacles to Third Party Success
• Proportional Representation: A voting
system that awards seats according to the
percentage of the vote won by a particular
political party. NOT USED IN
AMERICA!
• Winner-take-all-system: An electoral
system in which the party that receives at
least one more vote than any other party
wins the election. (“single-member
plurality”)
Third Party Spoilers
• Third Party candidates are often accused of
syphoning votes from the person who
“should have” won a particular position.
This is called the “spoiler effect”.
– Ralph Nader – took votes in FL from Al Gore
in 2000
– Ross Perot – took votes from George Bush in
1992 and Bob Dole in 1996.
The Basic
Structure of
American
Political
Parties
Party Organization
• DNC: Democratic National Committee
• RNC: Republican National Committee
– Both lead by a “Chairperson”
– Chairperson is appointed by President or
Presidential Candidate
– In between elections & When out of power –
the National Committees elect their own
Chairpersons.
– Chairperson
• Strong fundraising role
• Negotiator/Dispute Arbitrator
National Conventions
• National Convention: A party meeting held
in the presidential election year for the
purposes of nominating a presidential and
vice presidential ticket and adopting a
platform.
Party Discipline
• Most regulation of party activities is left to
states, not national leadership.
• 2008 – MI and FL (Dem) scheduled
presidential primaries for January – before
IA and NH.
• DNC voted to deny both states half their
voting power at the National Convention.
Informal Groups
• Both parties have:
– Think Tank: Institutional collection of policyoriented researchers and academics who are
sources of policy ideas.
– Governors Associations
– College/Young divisions
– National Federation of ___ Women
MONEY!!!
• Soft Money: The virtually unregulated
money funneled through political parties for
party building purposes, such as get out the
vote efforts or issue ads.
• Citizens United (2010): SCOTUS overruled
most parts of BCRA (2002), restoring the
ability of corporations, unions, and
organizations to spend money for
“electioneering purposes”.
Eight “Magic Words”
• Ads move from “issue ads” to “express
advocacy” when they include:
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Vote for
Elect
Support
cast your ballot for
Smith for Congress
Vote against
Defeat
Reject
• Footnote in Buckley v. Valeo (1976)
MONEY!!!
• Hard money: Funds that can be used for
direct electioneering but are limited and
regulated by the Federal Elections
Commissions
• Money = Speech
– Buckley v. Valeo
– “the concept that government may restrict the
speech of some [in] order to enhance the
relative voice of others is wholly foreign to the
First Amendment.” –Justice Brennan
The Party in Government
• The Congressional Party
• The Presidential Party
• The Parties and the Judiciary
• The Parties and State
Government
The Party-In-The-Electorate
• The party-in-the-electorate is the mass of potential voters
who identify with specific party.
• American voters often identify with a specific party, but
rarely formally belong to it.
• Party identification is often a voter's central political
reference symbol.
• Party identification generally come from one's parents.
• However party id can be affected by a number of factors
such as education, peers, charismatic personalities,
cataclysmic events, and intense social issues.
Declining Party Loyalty?
• The number of independents in the U.S. rose
from 19% in 1958 to 37% twenty years later.
• Identification with the two major parties today is
in the mid 80% range.
• Pollsters often find that many self declared
independents often 'lean' quite strongly to either
the Democrat or Republican party.
• “Leaners” do feel party affiliations, but choose
not to self-identify with a party.
Loyalty Trends - Democratic
• Labor union members tend to vote Democratic
• Democrats have a lead in garnering the women's
votes
• Over 80% of African Americans and Hispanics
vote 3 to 1 Democratic
• Young people are again more Democratic
• Most blue collar workers and unemployed are
Democrats
• Catholics and Jews are mostly Democrats
• The widowed are mostly Democrats
• Liberals tend to be Democrats
Loyalty Trends - Republican
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Chambers of Commerce tend to vote Republican
The West tends to be more Republican
Men tend to split fairly evenly between the two parties
Cuban Americans are generally Republicans (anti-Castro)
Professionals, executives, and white collar workers
tend to be Republican
• High status Protestants tend to be Republican
• Married couples tend to be Republican
• Conservatives tend to be Republican
Websites
Major Parties
• Democratic National Committee
– www.democrats.org
• Republican National Committee
– www.rnc.org
Third Parties
• Third Party Central
– www.3pc.net/index.html
• Libertarian Party
– www.lp.org
• Reform Party.
– www.reformparty.org