It’s a Party in the USA

A Two-Party System is One Party away from a One-Party State.

I’ve often made the observation that the real political divide in this country is between a party which wants to gloss over the historical irony of the founding of this Nation on notions of freedom and liberty while enshrining the legally-sanctioned enslavement of human beings which constituted nearly a third of its population, and a party which wants to extend the collective guilt which our history of slavery evokes to as many other groups of peoples who are not descended from slaves as possible in order to exploit them. There a few problems with this, not least of which is that slavery has indeed been abolished since 1865. However, the ill treatment afforded immigrants, homosexuals, transgendered, and other groups championed by the latter party in no way are owed the societal guilt which the United States carries with regards to its forced importation of Africans (euphemistically categorized in the Constitution as “other persons”) and their generational oppression. Women are somewhat of a caveat to this statement, but their lack of equality is a result of social and cultural mores which reach farther back than not only the colonization of the Americans and initiation of the African slave trade, but of Western civilization itself. But I digress…

Historically, the political “divide” in the United States, since at least 1787 has been between those who support a strong, centralized Federal Government, and those who would prefer a weak, decentralized one — or none at all.

The above description is the easiest way to find a modern dividing line between the “conservatives” and the “liberals”, two terms which — much like everything else we inherited from the British — have been so mangled and twisted as to be barely recognizable to anyone else. American conservatives will tell you the real ideological divide is about government, specifically the Federal Government, and how much power it has over individual liberty; they argue that American liberals are only interested in using Federal power to restrict personal freedom. Of course, with the exception of “pure” Libertarians (who often confusingly also identify themselves as conservatives as well), this only applies if we aren’t talking about having Congress pass Federal laws restricting personal behavior which conflicts with certain religious and cultural viewpoints. Watch out for that Sharia Law though! There is more truth to this than the liberal argument of “protecting” rights through Federal law though — given their previously-described propensity to categorize everyone who isn’t an English-speaking, heterosexual male of European descent of no less than three generations as victims of institutionally-enforced discrimination on par with chattel slavery. Historically, the political “divide” in the United States, since at least 1787 has been between those who support a strong, centralized Federal Government, and those who would prefer a weak, decentralized one — or none at all.

[The founders] set the stage for something far worse than ideological parties in search of power — parties of power in search of ideology.

I made the rather immense chart that accompanies this rant after being both intrigued and frustrated with several similar ones which sought to “map” the political changes in our Nation’s history. While the modern Democratic and Republican (or “Grand Old”) Party trace their histories to organizations founded in 1828 and 1854, respectively, they bear absolutely no resemblance to their original incarnations. There is often talk of the great “switch” in 1968 (which in my analysis occurred a generation earlier and had to do with both parties adopting “Progressivism” to offset the threat of Communist and Fascist populism… but that’s for another rant…) but both parties had ceased to be ideologically distinct for a generation before that happened. There is a recurrent theme in American political history, however, and that is that there has always been a party of government and an opposition party. The irony being that in their attempt to avoid the partisan politics and intrigue of Parliament, they set the stage for something far worse than ideological parties in search of power — parties of power in search of ideology. As you can see, and no doubt learned in grade school, at the very beginning the first two parties were the “Federalists” and the “Anti-Federalists”. This is a misnomer and it is very often ignored or forgotten that these names are somewhat disingenuous. The reality was that there was a political faction in support of ratification of the Constitution to replace the Articles of Confederation and a faction opposed to this — even after it became the foundational document of the government itself.

…although there were factional alliances with their own local “politics” there was no real ideological divide and no such thing as a political party…

It’s worth digressing here to explain that there have actually been three governments of an independent American nation. The first — starting with the meeting of the First (and later Second) Continental Congress in 1774, was more of an autonomous and unrecognized assembly of colonial governments still nominally under the sovereignty of the British Empire — though they were the ones which initiated the Revolutionary War and declared independence in 1776. It wasn’t until 1781 that the United States took form with a national government under the Confederation Congress which formally adopted the Articles of Confederation, our first constitution. During this period, although there were factional alliances with their own local “politics” there was no real ideological divide and no such thing as a political party such as the Whigs and Tories which existed in London. Ironically the original incarnation of the Whigs and Tories was spawned by ideological differences on the absolute power of monarchs, though this distinction had largely disappeared by the late 1700s. The government we recognize as the United States Government didn’t exist until the adoption of the Constitution in 1789 and the inauguration of George Washington as the first President of the United States, with the First United States Congress being comprised of Senators and Representatives who were either “pro-administration” or “anti-administration”.

In fact, when one looks at purely ideologically-based political parties in our Nation’s history they are quickly subsumed and dissolve.

This same label can be applied easily to the Democrats and Republicans of today, depending on who is President at the time, which effectively renders any ideological divisions purely rhetorical. This is seen demonstrated, for example, in the implementation of policies which were nearly identical to one party’s proposals, but are later denounced as ideologically radical once the other party introduced them. The policies and positions of one side shift to the other and back again with frequency through the observed political history of the Nation, dependent merely on whatever sentiments were in vogue with the electorate and allowed the established political organs to remain in power. In fact, when one looks at purely ideologically-based political parties in our Nation’s history — witness the “Anti-Masonic” or “Free Soil” and later “Dixiecrat” and “American Independent” parties — they are quickly subsumed and dissolve. Today they cannot even coalesce into an actual independent organization, “Tea Party” being largely a subset of registered Republicans, for example. The “radical leftists” of the Democratic Party which once championed (and then slowly reduced) marginal income tax rates as high as 90% can barely agree on whether a top rate of 35% is too much of a burden for millionaires. Meanwhile the “right wing ideologues” of the Republican Party worry about cutting too much from the subsidized Government-run tax-funded health care and pensions of the elderly.

The tyranny in our system is a tyranny of local government… the actual election is merely a legal formality, the “primary” election having already established the candidacy of the representatives presented.

This isn’t to say that there aren’t options available, the Green and Libertarian Parties are particularly resilient, the latter seemingly more so with the unexpected popularity of Donald Trump within the GOP (seeming to further prove the point of ideological homogeny between the two main parties). While the Green Party has traditionally been the refuge of that slice of voters who feel the government’s responsibility should be to extend Constitutional protections to non-humans the largest debate amongst the Libertarians is found in the adage that the best government is the one which governs least… if at all. But this is not the problem, for unlike totalitarian or authoritarian states there is no ban on any particular political organization, but there doesn’t need to be one. There isn’t really a national Democratic or Republican Party, but rather 100 individual Democratic and Republican Parties which have national committees. The tyranny in our system is a tyranny of local government, each of these individual major parties at the State-level, at the behest of the collective, intertwining their existence with lower levels of government through selective legislation which effectively excludes any political rivals — including the other major party in many instances — to an extent where the actual election is merely a legal formality. The party “primary” election having already de facto established the candidacy of the representatives presented. This is so pervasive that there are those who argue that the “solution” is to make the political primary process “more inclusive” — that is to say to open what are internal political party processes to non-party members because there is no other way to combat the stranglehold the Democratic and Republican Parties have on American government(s). Even Bernie Sanders, the radical, “democratic socialist” and perennial independent (despite associations with local political parties — anyone without a “D” or an “R” is an “I”) felt compelled to ditch his lack of affiliation in order to [un]successfully campaign for President.

[We need to] force the Democrats and Republicans to form “coalitions” in order to govern effectively through compromise — which is the real founding principle of the Constitution of the United States.

So am I just regurgitating the anti-conformist ramblings of my teenage years, tilting at the partisan windmills of reality in an attempt to give legitimacy to my rejection of the system which I must inevitably operate to be a functioning member of American society? Sadly, no. I’m pointing out that much like the rose-colored historical glasses through which “conservatives” view America, and the utopian ideological fantasies of the future envisioned by the “liberals” — there isn’t a way to “fix” the system. The Constitution describes a government which was not designed to function with political factions at all, much less two parties which are near equals in electoral balance and which define themselves largely on their intractable opposition to the other. Yet this is what exists, and we cannot “unmake” political parties any more than we can “uninvent” the nuclear bomb. Nor should we — in order to make our government more “parliamentary” — call for some second constitutional convention to rewrite portions of a document which, although flawed in some respects, has managed to be more adaptable and permanent than any other constitution in modern history.

Ideally the solutions are twofold, the forcible extraction of the Democratic and Republican Parties from their entrenchment in all levels of government (so that elections actually matter and internal party matters are just that); and the creation of two “minor” parties which are equally bereft of strict ideological purity (unlike the Green and Libertarian Parties) so as to force the Democrats and Republicans to form “coalitions” in order to govern effectively through compromise — which is the real founding principle of the Constitution of the United States.

Of course the likelihood of this occurring is negligible, given our current cultural and societal proclivities and the skill at which the two parties have continued to maintain their duopoly of power. So until then, good night and good luck.