Two Party System In America

1095 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: American political culture chapter 1

One of the greatest things America is known for is its democracy. We were founded on the principles of democracy, we continue to try and uphold the ideals of democracy, and we consistently intervene in on other countries in an attempt to have them become a democratic nation. Despite the effort, however, even in a nation as powerful as America, our democracy is both flawed and fragile. If we take into account the Electoral College as our foundation of democracy, bipartisanism, and the notion of politicians and elections being bought by corporations, PACs, and SuperPACs, it is clear to see that our democracy is a far cry from perfect. In American history, there have only been 5 presidents elected into office that lost the popular vote but were
Despite having a vast amount of parties in the United States, it’s clear that we have a bipartisan government. It has become that you either have to vote Democrat or Republican, or else your vote becomes basically useless. Bipartisanism conceals differences between the parties and attempts to discourage any agreements between anyone other than the two major parties. The issue with this is now voters have to vote based on one of two parties, rather than on the issues. You could not like a large part of what a candidates says, but still end up voting for them because the one other relevant candidate you abhorrently disagree with. So then issues important to you could effectively go unnoticed and unchanged. An example of where bipartisanism became a huge issue was in this most recent election. Many people were not a fan of Donald Trump, but because of many people’s abhorrent dislike for Hillary Clinton, voted for Donald Trump, and vice versa, because they felt those were the only two choices they had. In reality, there were other candidates such as Jill Stein and Gary Johnson, but since it’s rare for mainstream media to pay attention to third-party candidates, many people didn’t know about them. Even more importantly, people didn’t bother voting for these candidates because they knew the unlikelihood of a third-party candidate to win. Admittedly, there would be flaws if we allowed for a whole plethora of candidates to arise. It could make it so someone would only have to win by a slim majority, even if they weren’t overwhelmingly voted for, like Adolf Hitler. What having a bipartisan system does do, however, is limit our sense of democracy to a small scope, thereby potentially eliminating the chance of very important issues ever getting

Show More
Related

  • Pros And Cons Of Selective Incorporation

    906 Words  | 2 Pages

    8.In order for political success, both sides of the political spectrum must be critically examined in order to omit mistakes and for cultural advancement. Over two hundred years of United States politics have seen many changes. The names of parties may have changed, but the bi-partisan feature of the party-system has not. Republicans and Democrats are our two major partisan groups in present day America. Sometimes there are disagreement amongst party members that lead to dispute and a less concentrated effort. That is the beauty of a democracy, everyone is allowed to put their two cents worth in.

    Read More

  • The Inevitable Two-Party System in the U.S.

    1535 Words  | 4 Pages

    Was the formation of a two-party system in America inevitable? Despite George Washington’s warnings of the drawbacks in his farewell address, America continued on its path, and the system was established anyway. The emergence of a two-party system was inevitable in the United States for many reasons. One reason for the two party systems that formed were simply common issues of the day. This included the issue of federal power versus state power, which dominated American politics during the 1700s. America was also quite polar, meaning different regions tended to have different views and opinions from the others. Political parties often appealed to specific regions. Matters of the day were very influential on the types of political parties present in America, who tended to form around issues, rather than issues being assigned to them like in present day politics.

    Read More

  • Political Polarization in the United State

    1401 Words  | 3 Pages

    Whether political polarization is good or bad for the nation is still up for debate, but the general consensus is it exists due to a variety of reasons. From the construction of our Constitution, it is clear that the intent of our founding fathers was to create opposition in order to prevent tyranny from prevailing. Polarization is a result of the dividing of a nation into political parties. Though polarization has fluctuated throughout the years, it has caused a great deal of trouble in regards to passing legislation and has resulted in a gridlocked Congress. Even though some fear congressional polarization is destined to get worse, “it is mathematically impossible for congress to get much more polarized” than it is now.

    Read More

  • The Two-Party System

    1627 Words  | 4 Pages

    system produces conflicts between the Congress and the President and promotes very outdated beliefs that stem from the Constitution. A vast majority of the American population has the stern belief that the Constitution does not need to be changed in any way, shape, or form. This belief, however, is keeping the country from progressing along with other countries around the world. These single parties are holding control of multiple branches of government at once and monopolizing the power during their respective terms. The government “faces an incapacity to govern since each party works as a majority party” and believes there is no reason for innovation (Dulio & Thurber, 2000). The two parties are seemingly always clashing about one thing or the other, making it difficult for things to get accomplished, and proves the thesis correct that the two-party system is ineffective for a growing country.

    Read More

  • Dangers of the two party system

    735 Words  | 2 Pages

    The two party system has encouraged the idea that voting for anyone who is not ‘blue’ or ‘red’ is a wasted vote. This can be seen in the lack of votes that 3rd party candidates are getting, for example in 2012 between the three third party candidates there was a total of 1,570,767 votes.(IVN) This could be because only a little more than half of the voting age population actually voted. (GMU) Or it could be to the lack of media coverage that they get. Third party candidates, or any candidate for that matter need to get at least 5% of the vote in a general election to get equal ballot access and federal funding like the two big parties. Another reason this idea of a wasted vote comes through is because no one knows what these other parties stand for they just hear what people on CNN, MSNBC, or Fox News say about them. For instance the libertarian party has been deemed nothing more than a bunch of pot smoking hippies just because they want to legalize marijuana. The big media outlets don’t look at the party as a whole and find one unpopular opinion they have and bash it into the skulls of their viewers as the truth.

    Read More

  • The Electoral College Vs. Popular Vote

    1203 Words  | 3 Pages

    The United States is a privileged country with freedoms and opportunities many countries strive to achieve. People come into the United States in hopes to obtain these rights and make a better life for themselves; they strive to achieve “The American Dream.” Citizens are given the chance to vote, speak their mind, and live according to their desires without prejudice. However, the same government that promises hope has flaws that frustrate the American people; the Electoral College is one topic of debate. Many feel this system is a safe way to regulate who leads the country, while others feel that issues should be left to popular vote.

    Read More

  • The Second Party System

    718 Words  | 2 Pages

    The breakdown of the second party system was also a reason for the outbreak of the Civil War. In the early 1850’s the Whig party disintegrated, the second party system collapsed and the Republican Party emerged to challenge the Democrats. Southern Revisionists have argued that the collapse of the Union had been preceded by the collapse of the 2nd party system and that the Whig disappeared only to re-emerge as the new Republican party in 1854 supported by nativist Know-Nothing votes. They have also argued that politicians created this tension on purpose to advance their careers, but by doing so they made the 2nd party system collapse. However recent historians, such as Hugh Tulloch, contradict this view by arguing that there is no one single

    Read More

  • The United States' Two-Party System

    525 Words  | 2 Pages

    A two-party system is a political system in which only two parties have a realistic opportunity to compete effectively for control. As a result, all, or nearly all, elected officials end up being a member in one of the two major parties. In a two-party system, one of the parties usually holds a majority in the legislature hence, being referred to as the majority party while the other party is the minority party. The United States of America is considered to be a two-party system. A two-party system emerged early in the history of the new Republic. Beginning with the Federalists and the Jeffersonian Republicans in the late 1780s, two major parties have dominated national politics, although which particular two parties has changed with the times and issues. During the nineteenth century, the Democrats and Republicans emerged as the two dominant parties in American politics. As the American party system evolved, many third parties emerged, but few of them remained in existence for very long. Today the Democrats and Republican still remain as the dominant parties. These two parties hav...

    Read More

  • Electoral College Reform

    1903 Words  | 4 Pages

    Since the fiasco that was the Presidential Election in the year 2000, many Americans have been calling for a reform of the Electoral College. Most of these people were Gore supporters; disillusioned by the fact that Bush won the office of the President while, in fact, he lost the popular vote. The American people did not elect George W. Bush; the Electoral College did.

    Read More

  • The Political Division of the United States

    1497 Words  | 3 Pages

    I agree with many of the points that Wilson brings up in his article, as stated previously. The gap between liberals and conservatives is getting wider and wider, leaving nowhere for those with moderate views to be in the mix. Polarization is detrimental to our two-party dominated republic, and it is difficult to determine what may fix our political system.

    Read More

  • The First Political Parties

    2273 Words  | 5 Pages

    Today, political parties can be seen throughout everyday life, prevalent in various activities such as watching television, or seeing signs beside the road while driving. These everyday occurrences make the knowledge of political parties commonly known, especially as the two opposing political parties: the Republicans and the Democrats. Republican and Democrats have existed for numerous years, predominantly due to pure tradition, and the comfort of the ideas each party presents. For years, the existence of two political parties has dominated the elections of the president, and lower offices such as mayor, or the House of Representatives. Fundamentally, this tradition continues from the very emergence of political parties during the election of 1796, principally between Federalist John Adams and Anti-federalist Thomas Jefferson. Prior to this election people unanimously conformed to the ideas of one man, George Washington, and therefore did not require the need for political parties.1 However, following his presidency the public was divided with opposing opinions, each arguing the best methods to regulate the country. Ultimately, the emergence of different opinions regarding the future of the United States involving the economy, foreign relations, ‘the masses,’ and the interpretation of the Constitution, led to the two political parties of the 1790s and the critical election of 1800.

    Read More

  • America's Democracy

    1078 Words  | 3 Pages

    The United States of America is a republic, or representative democracy. Democracy, a word that comes to us from Greek, literally means the people rule (Romance, July 8). This broad definition leaves unanswered a few important details such as who are the people, how shall they rule, and what should they rule on (July 8). Defining the answers to those questions means defining a model for a democratic system. William E. Hudson defines four such models in his book American Democracy in Peril: the Protective, Developmental, Pluralist, and Participatory models of democracy (Hudson, 8-19). Of these models, perhaps Participatory comes closest to an ideal, pure democracy of rule by the people (16-19). In practice, however, establishing a stable ideal democracy is not entirely feasible. In a country the size of the United States, it quickly becomes unwieldy if not impossible to have direct rule by the people. To overcome this, the compromise of the representative system allows the people to choose who will rule on a regular basis. The political culture that defines American politics shows that despite this compromise, America is still very much a democratic society.

    Read More

  • Electoral College

    1454 Words  | 3 Pages

    Beginning in America in 1787, the Electoral College was originally created during the Constitutional Convention to help make a fair way for the president to be elected without giving too much power to either the national government or individual states. Over the years, the Electoral College has undergone a few changes in attempt to make it more fair, but there is still much debate about whether or not the Electoral College is the most effective way to elect a president. Some people believe that the Electoral College does an excellent job of creating an equal distribution of votes across all ethnicities and social classes of America. In contrast, others think that the Electoral College does not give an accurate portrayal of the popular opinion of Americans, believing that the Electoral College is no longer necessary for the election process in our society. The issue of whether or not the Electoral College should be a part of our government is important to our society, because it has had a dramatic effect on who is elected as president. Several times in American history a potential presidential candidate has obtained the presidential office only because of the Electoral College, despite the fact that they lost the popular vote. Therefore, the Electoral College should be removed from the government and replaced with an election system based on the popular vote.

    Read More

  • Pros Of Conserving The Electoral College

    1020 Words  | 3 Pages

    The United States of America, which is typically characterized as the beacon of democracy, has been surpassed by nations that better exemplify democratic principles. It is common knowledge that decisions are made by representatives rather than through direct democracy. These representatives are not always directly chosen by the people, but rather through convoluted partisan processes. The idea of democracy as opposed to monarchy became popular during the Enlightenment in Europe. The ideals and principles explored during that time are woven into modern government. The idea that protections must be made against tyranny of the majority and minority were also developed in this time. In the United States, one such protection is the Electoral College,

    Read More

  • Power Of Elites Essay

    1395 Words  | 3 Pages

    America prides itself on being a democracy when in fact, these ideals are only a political illusion. The Constitution of the United States deems the nation a republic, thus regarding the people’s desire to be a democracy, yet there is much evidence that suggests America is an oligarchy. While a republic’s citizens elect many representatives to make governmental decisions on their behalf, an oligarchic country is controlled by a small group of elites. The idea of America being an oligarchy assumes that elites have the power in many aspects of government, such as the election process and the Electoral College, in Congress, and federal judges in the Supreme Court. The Constitution creates a political illusion of democracy that gives the impression of the people having power in the many aspects of government when, in reality, the elites dominate the Legislative, Executive, and Judiciary branches of government, creating an oligarchy.

    Read More

More about Two Party System In America

Open Document