The Development of a 7th Party System?

It is possible to break the development of the US party system into several eras, each being dominated by two political parties and each lasting for a few decades before some seismic political shift breaks the status quo with the system rearranging itself. The first of these systems dominated the early years of the Republic with the Federalists of Hamilton and the Democratic-Republicans of Jefferson and Madison. The former broadly speaking favoured a stronger central government and the latter sound money and more limited government. This paradigm was broken around 1828 with the Federalists losing prominance and the Democratic Republicans splitting between the Democratic party of Jackson and the Whigs of Henry Clay. The main issues of contention in this era were economic interventionism as the Democrats favoured Laissez Faire and sound money and the Whigs a greater degree of government involvement in industrialisation. The parties were also increasingly split along religious and ethnic lines with Germans and Catholics voting strongly Democratic and the Whigs being favoured by the growing evangelical movement in the North: a pattern of religous and ethnic influence on politics that was to become increasingly important.

This Second system collapsed as the abolitionist movement grew and the Republican party took the place of the Whigs, the regional, ethnic and religious divides increased over this period and saw the Republican party become the party of the Evangelical Yankee vote in the North-East and the South along with Catholics and German Lutherans in the North and mid-West vote for the Democrats. This alignment was interrupted by the civil war when the Democrats were virtually wiped out in the North but by the 1880s this alignment has returned. There were many reasons for this party affiliation: the South disliked the pietism and abolitionism of the Yankee’s, their hatred of the Republican party only intensified by the civil war, the Germans and Catholics disliked the prohibitionist movement within the Republican party, the Germans also objected to the inflationary monetary policy of the Republican’s and were great supporters of the Gold standard, a central part of the Democratic platform. An important thing to note about the late 19th century is that the demographics were moving strongly towards the Democratic party with the increasing numbers of Germans, Italians and Irish. Had the  party system stayed the same the Democrats would have become dominant.

However, as before, things changed quickly in the election of 1896 with William Jennings Bryan seizing control of the Democratic party, pushing for prohibition and campaigning against the gold standard, in the process alienating much of the democrats support in the North. At the same time McKinley dropped prohibition from the republican party and supported the Gold standard, in so doing winning the German vote. This opened the way for the “progressive era” and the fourth party system, dominated by the Republicans, during this period the Democrats only really gained support from Southerners and the Irish.  This alignment held until the new-deal when the Democrats became the majority party and this in turn only broke down in the 1960s when the civil-rights movement caused the South to abandon the democrats for the republicans. This has changed slightly in the mean time but we are essentially still in the same party system where the Democrats are prima facie the party of big government and social programs despite being slightly more anti-war and liberal on social issues, and the republicans are nominally the party of Business, interventionist foreign policy, fiscal prudence and social conservatism. I use caution with these party characterisations because whatever the rhetoric the resultant policy once in government is surprisingly similar.

Understanding this ever changing nature of the American party system is important and I hope my brief summary is enough to appreciate my argument about the American politics of today. It seems to me that the situation is ripe for another shift in the political dynamic of the United States and perhaps the development of what might one day be called the 7th party system. Regardless of whether Ron Paul wins the republican nomination – and I believe he probably won’t – the movement he has created since 2007 will only increase in significance in the coming years, he himself has talked about his run not so much being a candidacy for president, but a cause.

The really significant thing about Ron Paul is not that he is garnering support within the Republican party, but that he so clearly doesn’t fit the party dynamic, he attracts the support of both Republicans and Democrats and incurs the wrath of both. If the libertarian movement continues to grow within the Republican party – perhaps someday to dominate it – it will alienate many of the current factions and interest groups within the party. Similarly many Democrats who once endorsed them for their anti-war and pro-civil liberties stance will start to realise there is an alternative. This is what makes it likely that we will see a realignment in American politics: 5 years ago one could characterize the Republicans as fiscally and socially conservative and democrats as fiscally and socially liberal (ignoring the fact that fiscally conservative in America actually means classically liberal), once this dynamic breaks down and one party is socially liberal and fiscally conservative  many will find themselves ill at ease with their party. Just as in the past when major shifts in one party pushed people to change allegiance, should the Republicans take up a libertarian ideology this would have much the same effect. The social conservatives would leave the Republican party, so might big business such as the military-industrial complex and Democrats who primarily supported them for their social liberalism will move to the Republicans. This will likely leave a Democratic party with only the people who valued their big-government welfarism higher than social liberalism and this may leave a gap for the social conservatives to move in.

This is all highly speculative and being on the wrong side of the Atlantic it is difficult for me to judge the mood on the ground but I do not see it as too unfeasible that the big government republicans might form an alliance with the big government democrats. Indeed, it would be a much more logical alignment than there is currently, the libertarian ideals of social and economic liberalism (fiscally conservative for Americans) should be seen as two sides of the same coin. Likewise Democrats who support government intervention in economic affairs might be expected to have equally little qualms about government intervention in private affairs and vice-versa for the social conservatives.

All of this is dependent upon the Ron Paul faction of the Republican party continuing to gain ground but I have little doubt that they will. When looking at polling it is more important to look at the momentum than the numbers as they stand. Paul maybe represents 15-20% of the Republican party, but that is probably more than double what he did in 2008. As America’s financial condition continues to worsen and she continues to be bogged down in foreign wars and see her liberties legislated away, there can only be one direction of support for Ron Paul and the probable heir to his movement, Rand Paul. I would not be surprised to see a Rand Paul candidacy in 2016 or 2020 win the Republican nomination and the presidency.