American Political Party System Essay

The American political party system has been a jigsaw puzzle since its inception July 2, 1776. America is a political system of two main parties: the republicans and the democrats. Although there are other parties that exist republicans and democrats are the only two that win positions in office. To establish the two party system means when there are splinter parties that are rarely parties created claiming neither democrat or republican but rather fractions of the original party. For example there are Conservative, Libertarian, and Progressive wings of both the democratic and republican parties. The topic then begs the question why do political parties splinter and is the result for the betterment of humanity/the country? It is human nature to form groups when the members are similar; animals are grouped by air, water, and land, food is grouped my origin and ingredients, religion is grouped by belief etc; therefore, it is only natural for people to do the same within the political world. People are drawn together by similar beliefs and that is how different parties originate. The parties can splinter several different ways. A popular view is that political parties splinter when one party is turned against itself. This has happened all through out history. A popular example is the election of 1912
Alexander, the author of “Splinter Groups in American Radical Politics”, argued that the reason Democrats and Republicans do not have set morals is because “such ideas are alien to the American tradition. Almost since political parties first evolved in the United States, ideas of party orthodoxy have been notoriously lax. There is little or no Democratic or Republican "orthodoxy" on anything. There are almost as many "factions" in each party as there are members” (Alexander 307) Nothing about that statement declares unity and it is because, like Mr. Alexander stated, there are more factions within Democratic and Republican party than