WHAT IS A POLITICAL PARTY?

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WHAT IS A POLITICAL PARTY?

• A party is a group that seeks to elect candidates
  to public office by supplying them with a label
  after winning elections

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Political Parties

• Chapter 7

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Functions of Political Parties

•  
• Connecting citizens to their government
• Running candidates for political office
• Informing the public
• Organizing the government

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• Why a Two Party System?
• One out of 15 democracies in the world today has
  two party systems.
• 3 factors contribute to our two party system
• Consensus of values
• Historical influence
• The Winner-Take-All System

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• Differences from European parties
• US Federal system decentralizes power
• a. Early on, most people with political jobs
  worked for state and local government
•  b. National parties were coalitions of
  local parties
• c. As political power becomes more centralized,
  parties become weaker still

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• 2. Parties closely regulated by state and federal
  laws
• 3. Candidates chosen through primaries, not by
  party leaders
• 4. President elected separately from
  Congress     

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The rise and fall of the political party

• The Founding (to the 1820s)
• Founders' dislike of factions George Washington
  on Political Parties

It (Parties) agitates the community with
ill-founded jealousies and false alarms kindles
the animosity of one part against another
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• 2. Emergence of Republicans, Federalists
  Jefferson versus Hamilton
• b. Republicans' success and Federalists' demise

v.
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The Era of Good Feeling

• Jefferson emerged as the most popular leader at
  the turn of the nineteenth century.
• The two parties' points of view seemed to merge
  most notably in the "Era of Good Feeling"
  presided over by James Monroe, one of Jefferson's
  protégés.
• The Democratic-Republicans emerged as the only
  party, and their dominance lasted until the
  mid-1800's, though under a new name, the Democrats

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• The Jacksonians (to the Civil War)
• 1. Political participation a mass phenomenon
• a. More voters to reach
• b. Party built from the bottom up
• c. Abandonment of presidential caucuses
•  d. Beginning of national conventions to allow
  local control
• e. More local control, especially to the states

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• The Civil War and Sectionalism
• 1. Jacksonian system unable to survive slavery
  issue. As economic and social tensions developed
  between North and South by the 1840's and 50's,
  Whig party unity was threatened by splits between
  the Southern and Northern wings- become the
  Republican Party.
• A new Republican Party emerged from the issue of
  expansion of slavery into new territories.
• 2. New Republicans become dominant because of
• Civil War and Republicans on Union sideParty
  would dominate U.S. politics from
  1860-1932

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• Democrats became fractured after the Civil War
• William Jennings Bryan alienation of northern
  Democrats in 1896
• Democrats will then regain control after 1932
  election

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•  3. In most states one party predominates
•  a. Party professionals, or "stalwarts," one
  faction in GOP
• b. Mugwumps (group of independent Republicans
  that broke away for good government),
  Progressives, or "reformers" another faction
• Most famous mugwumps
• Mark Twain

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• The era of reform
• 1. Progressive push measures to curtail parties
• Primary elections
• No party-business alliances
• Strict voter registration requirements
• Civil service reform
• Initiative and referendum elections

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The national party structure today

• Parties similar on paper
• National convention ultimate power nominates
  presidential candidate
• 2. National committee composed of delegates from
  states
• 3. Congressional campaign committees
• 4. National chair manages daily work

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The Era of Divided Government 1969-2003

• With a few exceptions, control of the legislature
  and the presidency has been "divided" between the
  two major political parties since the late 1940s.
  
• The division brings with it the problem of
  "gridlock", or the tendency to paralyze decision
  making, with one branch advocating one policy and
  the other another, contradictory policy.

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• Party structure diverges in the late 1960s
• 1. RNC moves to bureaucratic structure a
  well-financed party devoted to electing its
  candidates
• 2. Democrats move to factionalized structure to
  distribute power
• 3. RNC uses computerized mailing lists to raise
  money

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• National Conventions
• Large party gatherings with the purpose to elect
  a candidate for office. Nowadays its just a
  rubber-stamping of the results of the primaries.
  
• Main goal is to announce candidate to the public
  and establish platform.

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• National conventions
• 1. National committee sets time and place issues
  call setting number of delegates for each state
• 2. Formulas used to allocate delegates
• a. Democrats shift the formula away from the
  South to the North and West
• b. Republicans shift the formula away from the
  East to the South and Southwest
• c. Result Democrats move left, Republicans right

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• Consequence of reforms parties represent
  different set of upper-middle-class voters
• Republicans represent traditional middle class
• Democrats hurt because the traditional middle
  class closer in opinions to most citizens

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• Minor parties
• 4 Types of Minor parties
• Ideological parties comprehensive, radical view
  most enduring Examples Socialist, Communist,
  Libertarian

B. Single-issue parties address one concern,
avoid others Examples Free Soil, Know-Nothing,
Prohibition
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• C. Economic protest parties regional, appear
  during depressions and panics. Examples
  Greenbacks, Populists
• D. Splinter parties from split in a major party
  Examples Bull Moose, Henry Wallace, American
  Independent, Reform

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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?
• No. Democrats are liberals and Republicans are
  conservative

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Presidential Primaries

• Party elections before actual election.
• Usually held from February to June of the
  election year
• First state that starts it?
• New Hampshire
• Two types Open and Closed
• Open, anybody can vote. Closed, only party
  members vote.
• Raiding (opposition intruding primary)

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• Caucus meeting of party followers at which
  delegates are picked
• a. Only most-dedicated partisans attend
• b. Often choose most ideological candidate
• Jesse Jackson in 1984
• Pat Robertson in 1988

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Parties versus voters

• Formula for winning president
• a. Nominate candidates with views closer to the
  average citizen (e.g., 1996 election)
• b. Fight campaign over issues agreed on by
  delegates and voters (e.g., 1992 election)