How U.S political parties formed and changed over time

Nasser Ali

Introduction

Political parties perform various tasks within their nation states, their roles and existence have been subject to heated debates for many generations. Notable figures in U.S history such as the first president of the United States George Washington viewed them in a rather pessimistic fashion as he once famously warned against the “continual mischiefs of the spirit of party”. In hindsight we can see how his warning was not heeded by the political class of America. Nevertheless, a study of the United States is almost impossible without looking at the history of the political parties that functions within them. These parties are not constants, they form, change over time and ultimately break away. Not a single party in the entirety of U.S history has maintained the exact same stance on specific policy issues throughout its lifespan. Parties are ever changing political organisms that are subject to various factors that lead to them adjusting from time to time. The ideology of the members that combine to form these parties is what ultimately leads to parties not only forming, but also changing.

Purpose of political parties

Political parties do indeed carry with them certain benefits to the governmental systems that adopt them. Some of their most notable contributions involve serving as intermediaries as they create a communication channel between like-minded people within society to the government. They transmit the policies and ideology of the specific groups that they represent. In addition, they nominate candidates for various positions within government, this is vital as political parties help decrease the choice range for the various positions that exist and compete for a specific position, hence providing the voters with the best choices available from the various political parties available. They provide public accountability and manage conflict within the government as well.

How parties form and change

For this essay, I believe that the primary purpose political parties form and change over time is because of the second purpose mentioned as to why political parties exist as mentioned earlier, political parties transmit the policies and ideology of the specific groups that they represent. Political parties form as a result of a shared group of peoples unified set of ideas regarding how a government should function. However, the changes that occur over time are due to the same reason that lead to the formation of political parties, the distinct groups that form them. These groups are made up of members of similar ideological classes, however these people change their ideological leanings based on a wide range of external factors such as social class, income levels, geographical location, ethnicity, religious affiliation, etc. As and when these factors change the political parties core values adjust as well.

Basically, parties form and change due to ideology. They form when their core group of founding members agree on a set of issues, consequentially they change or divide when those unifying ideologies begin to diverge from each other. A common example in American history is the divide that occurred with the democratic-republicans as a result of the elections of 1824 whereby all four candidates were from the democratic-republican party itself. Andrew Jackson, who ran for president during that election was so infuriated with the result and referred to it as a corrupt bargain, broke away from the republican-democrats and started his own party, one that is now commonly known as “the democrats. In that instance it was the issue of changing ideologies within the founding class of a specific party.

Another common reason why political parties change over time occurs when their supporter base changes. Basically this is due to the party changing their policies which attracts voters that normally would not have voted for that specific party and alienating their previous voters who do not agree with the policy shifts. The New Deal is a very common occurrence whereby African American voters who were very known to have been loyal Republicans switched to Democrats as the Democrats were willing to implement policies that were more aligned with what they wanted. This is the most influential aspect that leads to changing political parties. When they change their policies to tackle a specific issue which leads to them changing their voter support and as a result of that political parties have to keep these policies and adjust their other policies to cater to their new voter base. Hence we end up with the current state of affairs where we have “A country where men and whites tend to back the Republican, while women and ethnic minorities flock to the Democrat’s candidate.” These common trends did not start on their own, but are rather a result of many years of political policy shifts, a common mistake most people make is claim that the Republican Party freed the slaves and use that fact to claim that the Republicans are more in line with African American rights. False, this misconception occurs when one does not take into account the fact that the ideological leanings of the members of the Republican party back then would now be classified as democratic, over the years many members of the democratic party joined the Republican party due to internal policy and ideology changes, same goes for Republicans. This same phenomenon occurred in early days of the United States when the Democratic Republican Party split into the Democratic and Whig parties. When the issue of slave and free states reached a boiling point and the Whig party could not align itself with either being pro slave state or pro free state, the divide led to the demise of the party with most of the anti-slavery/free state advocates joining the newly formed republican party. One of those Whigs was Abraham Lincoln.

As we have seen political parties are built upon the ideologies of their respective party members, whenever a change occurs within the party’s ideology we see a shift in the policies and public image the party has amongst the public. However, sometimes immense external pressure leads to parties having to change over time. Regardless of whether one was a democrat or a republican, segregation and racism was a bipartisan issue. Both parties were guilty of allowing it to spread and prosper throughout the country as both had their fair share of the blame. These policies led to some of the most shameful chapters in U.S History, and within that dark time rose the civil rights movement. The situation was so heinous during that time due to “Jim Crow laws at the local and state levels” which “barred them from classrooms and bathrooms, from theaters and train cars, from juries and legislatures”. The civil rights movement which lasted for more than a decade brought about such an immense shift in public opinion regarding racial segregation and equal rights that it led to the government in its entirety to shift its policies regardless of party lines. To this day both Democrats and the Republicans advocate equal rights with regards to their policies and seek to portray themselves as being unbiased towards the race of their constituents. Another way could be the advent of certain minority groups gaining immense power over a specific party as was seen with FDR when he became president and completely rebranded the Democratic party in the 1930s with his New Deal policies. In modern times this is shown with the advent of Donald Trump and the Republican party whereby although he is advocating ultra-conservative policies as reflected by his cabinet choices up until the date of this essay. Regardless, of how he shifts over time, Trump on his own has led to immense shifts in the political landscape in the United States such that we should definitely expect to see major changes over the coming years.

Conclusion

In conclusion, parties form and change over time primarily due to ideology; however, external factors could also lead to changes over time as seen above. What can be taken from this essay is that one must never associate a specific policy past or present strictly as being associated with a specific party as these changes occur many times over the course of a party’s life span. Hence, one must approach the classification of party ideology with extreme scrutiny before jumping to conclusions.

Bibliography

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Kirk, Ashley, and Patrick Scott. 2016. US election: How age, race and education are deciding factors in the race for President. November 7. www.telegraph.co.uk/news/0/us-election-how-age-race-and-education-are-deciding-factors-in-t/.

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[1] Alexander, Robert. 2013. Washington (George) got it right . October 16. http://edition.cnn.com/2013/10/16/opinion/alexander-washington-george/.

[2] Bibby, John F. 1996 . Politics, Parties, and Elections in America . Third Edition . Chicago : Nelson-Hall .

[3] Bibby, John F. 1996 . Politics, Parties, and Elections in America . Third Edition . Chicago : Nelson-Hall .

[4] Bibby, John F. 1996 . Politics, Parties, and Elections in America . Third Edition . Chicago : Nelson-Hall .

[5] Bibby, John F. 1996 . Politics, Parties, and Elections in America . Third Edition . Chicago : Nelson-Hall .

[6] Maisel, L. Sandy. 2016. American Political Parties and Elections. Oxford University Press.

[7] Kirk, Ashley, and Patrick Scott. 2016. US election: How age, race and education are deciding factors in the race for President. November 7. www.telegraph.co.uk/news/0/us-election-how-age-race-and-education-are-deciding-factors-in-t/.

[8] Staff, History.com. 2009. Civil Rights Movement. Accessed December 2, 2016. http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/civil-rights-movement.

[9] Staff, History.com. 2009. Civil Rights Movement. Accessed December 2, 2016. http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/civil-rights-movement.