4 ms·

> third party candidates are never going to happen More than two parties will never be stable unless elections are other than FPTP. But which two parties has

> third party candidates are never going to happen More than two parties will never be stable unless elections are other than FPTP. But which two parties has changed more than once through US history. I don't see a reason it couldn't possibly happen again.

dragonwriter 10y ago
It happened twice, both in the first century of US independence; whole there have been subsequent realignments, the identity of the two nationally-competitive parties have been stable for more than a century and a half. It's not implausible that the basic factors which promoted the relative fluidity of the party system in the early Republic are gone. (Direct election of senators and the near universal norm of assigning Presidential electors based on public elections both are factors which make the national parties more responsive to changes in the mood of the electorate, which reduces the risk of either being replaced.)
- dllthomas 10y ago
  > It's not implausible that the basic factors which promoted the relative fluidity of the party system in the early Republic are gone. I agree that it's not implausible. I'm just not convinced of it, on a time scale of "never".
- douche 10y ago
  It would be possible to consider the post-Nixon Southern Strategy flop of anti-civil-rights Democrats to form the new-look Republican party a third occurrence. That fundamentally changed the direction and outlook of both parties.
  - dragonwriter 10y ago
    There's actually several major realignments since the Republicans displaced the Whigs, but they differ from the changes from the First to Second and Second to Third Party System in that the identity of the two major parties did not change in those realignments; IIRC, the realignment you refer to is sometimes considered the third of those post-Civil War realignments (the one involving the New Deal Coalition is the second, and the first was in the Progressive Era.)
Latty 10y ago
Sure. And? Swapping a party around doesn't really solve any of the underlying problems. It may help a little in the short term, but FPTP encourages not only two parties, but the kind of polarisation that leads to the republican party as they stand now, pushed incredibly far to the right.
- dllthomas 10y ago
  Fair point. I think people often underestimate the benefit of short term help, but short term help that only arrives on a long-term timeline should rightfully be discounted. That said, if control shifts anytime soon to a current leading third party, I (weakly) expect electoral issues would be addressed - it's hard to drop something you've made so much noise about (though certainly not impossible).

dragonwriter 10y ago

It happened twice, both in the first century of US independence; whole there have been subsequent realignments, the identity of the two nationally-competitive parties have been stable for more than a century and a half. It's not implausible that the basic factors which promoted the relative fluidity of the party system in the early Republic are gone. (Direct election of senators and the near universal norm of assigning Presidential electors based on public elections both are factors which make the national parties more responsive to changes in the mood of the electorate, which reduces the risk of either being replaced.)

dllthomas 10y ago
> It's not implausible that the basic factors which promoted the relative fluidity of the party system in the early Republic are gone. I agree that it's not implausible. I'm just not convinced of it, on a time scale of "never".
douche 10y ago
It would be possible to consider the post-Nixon Southern Strategy flop of anti-civil-rights Democrats to form the new-look Republican party a third occurrence. That fundamentally changed the direction and outlook of both parties.
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  There's actually several major realignments since the Republicans displaced the Whigs, but they differ from the changes from the First to Second and Second to Third Party System in that the identity of the two major parties did not change in those realignments; IIRC, the realignment you refer to is sometimes considered the third of those post-Civil War realignments (the one involving the New Deal Coalition is the second, and the first was in the Progressive Era.)

Latty 10y ago

Sure. And? Swapping a party around doesn't really solve any of the underlying problems. It may help a little in the short term, but FPTP encourages not only two parties, but the kind of polarisation that leads to the republican party as they stand now, pushed incredibly far to the right.

dllthomas 10y ago
Fair point. I think people often underestimate the benefit of short term help, but short term help that only arrives on a long-term timeline should rightfully be discounted. That said, if control shifts anytime soon to a current leading third party, I (weakly) expect electoral issues would be addressed - it's hard to drop something you've made so much noise about (though certainly not impossible).