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[QUOTE]Originally posted by MinutiaeMan: [QB] [QUOTE]Originally posted by Harry: [qb] On a semi-related note, why [i]does[/i] America have only two significant parties? Has it just grown that way? Have there ever been marginally succesful 'third' parties? I mean, there [i]are[/i] other parties, aren't there? Or am I talking bull now? [/qb][/QUOTE]It's quite ironic, actually, but the Republican Party of today actually was itself a third party back when it was first founded in the 1850's. This may require a somewhat long treatise on the history of American politics, but I'll try to be brief. ;) Originally, there weren't supposed to be any political parties in Congress at all under the 1787 Constitution. Ideally, everyone was just supposed to work together. But within the first decade, two basic factions developed, which could generally be characterized as favoring strict or loose interpretation of the Constitution. There was no real party organization at all in those days, but they were generally referred to as "Federalists" (for the loose interpretation group, who looked to Alexander Hamilton as the "leader" in terms of philosophy and policy), and the "Democratic-Republicans" or just "Republicans" (for the strict interpration group, following Thomas Jefferson). After the administrations of Jefferson and Madison, the Federalist party basically collapsed and disappeared. America was actually a one-party government (unofficially) for about 15 to 20 years, before some disagreements arose (partially pertaining to North/South sectionalism), and the Whig Party was founded. IIRC, the Whigs did include some former Federalists from a few decades before, but they didn't take a whole strong connection. The Democratic-Republicans gradually came to be known as Democrats by the 1830's or so, the same Democratic Party we know and love (or not) today. The whole build-up to the American Civil War from around 1848 until 1861 created a huge mess in politics. The Republican Party was founded in the 1850's and was only becoming popular because all the other parties were divided into North/South branches. Basically, there were two separate parties for each party name -- like the Northern Democrats and the Southern Democrats. Then there were the Northern Whigs, the Southern Whigs, and the Conscience Whigs, the Free Soil Party... and my personal favorite, the "Know-Nothing Party." (Which came from its secretive practices, when the members would answer "I know nothing" to any question about them.) After the Civil War, everyone who was against the strict anti-slavery Republican policies basically unified under the Democratic banner. Aside from a few "populist" parties in the 1890's (early socialism, basically) and Teddy Roosevelt's "Bull Moose" Party in 1912, the US has been pretty well locked into the two-party system. Which, in my personal opinion, definitely sucks for us. Well, that about sums it up. In the future, never ask an open-ended question like this when a History major is lurking about... :p [/QB][/QUOTE]
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