What is a political party?
- Political Party:
A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific ideological or policy goals.__________
- Political parties in the United States:
American electoral politics have been dominated by two major political parties since shortly after the founding of the republic of the United States of America. Since the 1850s, the two have been the Democratic Party and the Republican Party—one of which has won every United States presidential election since 1852 and controlled the United States Congress since at least 1856. Despite keeping the same names, the two parties have both evolved in terms of ideologies, positions, and support bases over their long lifespans, in response to social, cultural, and economic developments—the Democratic Party being the left-of-center party since the time of the New Deal, and the Republican Party now being the right-of-center party.
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Current Major Parties:
- Democratic:
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States. Founded in 1828, it was predominantly built by Martin Van Buren, who assembled politicians in every state behind war hero Andrew Jackson, making it arguably the world's oldest active political party. The party is a big tent of competing and often opposing viewpoints, but modern American liberalism, a variant of social liberalism, is the party's majority ideology. The party also has notable centrist and social democratic factions. Its main political rival has been the Republican Party since the 1850s.
- Republican:
The Republican Party, also known as the GOP ("Grand Old Party"), is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States. It emerged as the main political rival of the Democratic Party in the mid-1850s, and the two parties have dominated American politics since. The GOP was founded in 1854 by anti-slavery activists who opposed the Kansas–Nebraska Act, which allowed for the potential expansion of chattel slavery into the western territories. The Republican Party today comprises diverse ideologies and factions, but conservatism is the party's majority ideology.
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Terminology
- parties as organizations
- parties in the government
- parties in the electorate
- partisan elections
- nonpartisan elections
- winner take all elections
- two party system
- proportional representation
- coalition
- multi party system
- autocracies
- single party systems
- major parties
- minor parties
- American party system
- party eras
- critical elections
- elite politics
- Federalist Party
- Democrat-Republican Party
- Democratic Party
- mass politics
- local party machines
- local party bosses
- Whig Party
- abolitionism
- Republican Party
- 1860 Election
- Populist Party
- Progressive Party
- New Deal
- 1948 election
- civil rights
- Southern Strategy
- realignment
- the great sort
- party identification
- base voters
- straight ticket
