Abernathy2e full ppt09_political_parties_edited

Chapter 9
Political Parties:
The Insurgents versus the
Establishment

Political Parties
• At first glance, it may seem that
American political parties exercise
control over candidates running for their
nominations, as is the case here, with
Donald Trump displaying his signed
pledge to support the party’s eventual
presidential nominee.
• The reality is quite different: Trump won
the nomination over the objections of
many party leaders, and several of the
candidates who lost to Trump
repudiated their pledges by publicly
refusing to support Trump in the general
election.

Party Partisanship –
How Did We Get Here?
4
https://vimeo.com/366109901

2016 Presidential Election
• Republican Donald Trump
• Vermont senator Bernie Sanders
• Unusual and extreme policy positions
• Uninterested in courting party elites
• Populism
– A political movement that challenges the political
establishment
Abernathy, American Government, 2e
SAGE Publishing, 2020
5

Bernie Sanders and
Income Inequality
• “Independent socialist”
• Criticized corporate welfare
• Criticized Democrats accepting donations from Wall
Street companies and employees
• Spoke on Senate floor for over eight hours against tax
cuts for wealthy Americans
• Popular with young liberals
6

Donald Trump and Controversy
• No prior political experience
• No consistent party allegiance
• Contradicted Republican philosophy of limited
government
• Extreme statements on immigration
• Free media attention
• Tapped into deep frustration with politics and parties
7

Challenge to Party Establishment
• Similarities of Trump and Sanders
– Refusal to rely on large outside campaign
contributions
– Message of economic pessimism
– Active criticism of mainstream party beliefs on trade
• Disrupted traditional system of election
8

Role of Parties (1 of 2)
• Functions of political parties
– Credible check on opposition
– Promote different ideas and candidates
• Responsible party model
– A proposal for party reform
– Emphasizes cohesive party positions
o Presents voters with a clear set of choices
o Allows members’ voices to be effectively
incorporated into party positions on issues
10

Role of Parties (2 of 2)
• V.O. Key Jr. three primary roles of political parties
• Finding, supporting, and nominating candidates for
office
– Decentralization of parties
– National and state party leadership
11

Recruiting and Supporting
Candidates (1 of 2)
• Recruitment
– The process through which political parties identify
potential candidates
• Nomination process
– Support of party delegates
o Presidential primary elections
• Open or closed primaries
o Caucus
12

Recruiting and Supporting
Candidates (2 of 2)
– Front-loading
– National conventions
o Superdelegates and awarding delegates
• Effectiveness of parties
13

Parties as Labels
• Serve as informational shortcuts
• Difference between political ideology and party
identification
• Changing identification with political parties
– Split-ticket voting
o When a voter chooses a candidate from one party
for one office and a candidate from a different
party for another position on the ballot
14

Sanders’ Supporters Cry “Foul!”
• Argued party’s superdelegate system provided Hillary
Clinton with an unfair advantage
• Accused DNC of blatantly favoring Clinton
– Data file controversy
• Argued over the number and timing of debates during
the primary season
15

Calls for Unity vs. Cries of “Foul”
at 2016 Democratic Convention
16

Donald Trump and
Republican Rules (1 of 2)
• Reluctance of Republican Party loyalists to join Donald
Trump
• Party rules enabled Trump to prevail in early primaries
• Inability to unify around consensus candidate
17

Donald Trump and
Republican Rules (2 of 2)
• Institutional advantages for an early frontrunner
– Earlier primary process
– System of awarding delegates
• Republican support for Ted Cruz
• Nastiness in modern presidential politics
– Fall in Republican Party image
18

“What Ifs” and Insurgency
• Speculation if Sanders could have drawn out more
voters
• Opposition to Trump from Republican Party
establishment
• Scandal around Trump’s comments about women
• Trump’s victory and consequences for the Republican
party
19

Party Systems - History
https://youtu.be/DTe_Kv1CvyE

Defining Features of Parties
in Government Today
• Party platform
– A set of positions and policy objectives that members
of a political party agree to
• Trump’s refusal to present detailed policy positions
• Gridlock from political polarization
– Disinterest in cooperation, focus on criticizing
opponents
21

Party Systems
• Each party system is separated from the next
one by a period of realignment
– Shift in size or composition of the party coalitions
– Shift in nature of the issues that divide the parties
• Issues that trigger realignments are those that
cause disagreements within the party coalitions

What, exactly, is a realignment?
• Realignment: a change in one or more of the factors that
define a party system, including the issues that divide
supporters and candidates from each party, the nature
and function of the party organizations, the composition of
the party coalitions, and the specifics of government
policy. Realignments typically occur within an election
cycle or two, but they can also occur gradually over the
course of a decade or longer.
• When do realignments occur? New issues can cause
realignments, but only if they are crosscutting, meaning
that they raise disagreements within a party coalition or
between political parties about what government should
do.

Crosscutting Issues
• Historical examples of crosscutting issues that led to
realignments include slavery, the gold and silver
standards, and civil rights. In the 1950s and 1960s,
parties were split on civil rights.
• Segregationists had allies in both the Democratic and
Republican parties, and so did supporters of racial
equality.
• Ultimately, the Democratic Party moved to support racial
equality, and the segregationists shifted support from
Democrats to Republicans.

Examples of Crosscutting Issues
• There is speculation that the internal party divisions on
the issues of free trade, cosmopolitanism and
immigration, which were uncovered during the 2016
presidential primaries (emphasized by both Bernie
Sanders and Donald Trump), may be sufficiently
crosscutting to trigger a realignment.

Party Organization
• Formal organization
– The National Committee is a party’s principal
organization, comprised of party representatives from each
state
– State party organizations are composed of representatives
at county, city, and town levels
• Other allied groups
– PACs, 527 organizations, and labor unions and interest
groups form a loose network of alliance with the major
parties.
• Best understood as a fluid structure rather than a rigid
hierarchy

527s and PACs
• 527 organizations, named after the section of the tax code that
governs them, are tax-exempt groups formed primarily to influence
elections through voter mobilization efforts and issue ads that do not
directly endorse or oppose a candidate.
• PACs are interest groups or divisions of interest groups that can
raise money to contribute to campaigns or to spend on ads in support
of candidates.
•The party’s national committee seeks to reflect the party (because
the party’s membership or “base” is the source of its power).
Constituency groups like African Americans, Hispanics, senior
citizens, people with strong religious beliefs, women, and many
others make up each major party.
•PACs are strictly limited in the amount they can receive from each of
their donors and their expenditures on federal electioneering.

527s and PACs
– Unlike PACs, 527s are not subject to contribution limits and spending
caps.
• The Tea Party, despite having “party” in its name, is closer to a 527
organization in that it is loosely affiliated with a major party but does not
run candidates of its own.
• It is also important to underscore how limited the party organization is
today in its ability to influence elections.
• Not only can the national party organization not compel state
organizations to do anything, it cannot force committee members to do
anything.
• Former DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz served at the pleasure of
the committee, not the other way around.
• The Republican Party was unable to prevent Tea Party members from
defeating its loyal supporters in congressional elections: Eric Cantor
(representative from Virginia) and Robert Bennett (senator from Utah)
were both victims of the party organization’s inability to influence the
election.

Party in Government
• Elected officials holding office as members of a party
• Caucuses and conferences
• Within the House and Senate, party members work
together to find areas of overlap and establish legislative
priorities
• Assign party leadership positions
• Polarization and ideological diversity
• Growing ideological differences between the parties
• Parties are composed of lots of ideologies, not uniformly
liberal or conservative

Party Caucuses
• The Democratic caucus and Republican conference are where
copartisans meet to resolve differences, coordinate strategy,
and choose party leaders. The fact that the party leaders are
elected by their party’s members means that party members
ultimately control their own fate.
• Current Speaker of the House Nancy Palosi, the most powerful
member of the House Democrats (the majority party), is unable
force her rank-and-file members to vote or act in a manner
against their will.
• But Democrats and Republicans act along partisan lines
because that’s what gets them re-elected or replaced,
depending on the positions they take.
• They still must be cognizant of their constituents and their best
interests.

Party Diversity
• Despite popular perception, the parties are still ideologically
diverse.
• And this diversity undermines the extent to which a party is
sufficiently able to deliver its party platform goals.
• If members of the Republican Party (GOP) do not want to address
the issue of immigration, the party is unable to force the issue.

Partisan Politics in America – Part 2

Two-Party Dominance (1 of 4)
• Realignment
– A major shift in allegiance to the political parties that
is often driven by changes in the issues that unite or
divide voters
• Critical election
– A major national election that signals a change either
in the balance of power between two major parties or
the emergence of a new party system
33

• Party systems
– Periods of stability of the composition of political
parties and the issues around which they coalesce,
brought on by shorter periods of intense change
34

• First party system
– Federalists and Democratic-Republicans
• Second party system
– Democrats and Whigs
• Third party system
– Republicans and Democrats
35

• Fourth party system
– Reconstruction and civil rights
– Immigration and industrialization
• Fifth party system
– Election of Franklin Roosevelt and Democratic Party
dominance
• Sixth party system
– Change in coalitions of voters supporting the parties
– New obstacles for the parties and incoming
demographic shift
36

Figure 9.6
American Party Systems (1 of 2)
37

Figure 9.6
American Party Systems (2 of 2)
38

America’s Electoral System Leads to
Two-Party Dominance
• Single-member plurality system
– A candidate must win the most votes in a state or
district in order to be represented in government
– Allows the largest politically cohesive groups to elect
almost every office
• Proportional representation systems
– Parties are represented in government according to
their candidates’ overall share of the vote
39

Why do we have a 2 party system?
40
https://youtu.be/gJTPPxF3xRI

Challengers to the
Two Major Parties
• Third party
– A political party operating over a limited period of
time in competition with two other major parties
• Focus on a single issue neglected by major parties
• 2000 election: Ralph Nader
• Work from major parties to discourage third-party
candidates
41

Why Can’t Third Parties “Take Off?”
42
https://youtu.be/gJTPPxF3xRI

Abernathy2e full ppt09_political_parties_edited

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