Fifth Party System

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The Fifth Party System, also called the New Deal Party System, refers to the era of United States national politics that began with the New Deal in 1933. It followed the Fourth Party System, usually called the Progressive Era. Experts debate whether it ended in the mid-1960s, the mid-1990's or continues to the present. The System was heavily Democratic through 1964 and mostly Republican at the presidential level since 1952, with the Senate swinging slowly back and forth after 1980, and both Houses going Republican in 1994, and Democratic in 2006. Of the nineteen Presidentiads since 1932, the Democrats have held ten; they held the first five, and Republican presidencies have been more common since 1952.

With Republican promises of prosperity discredited by the Great Depression, the four consecutive elections, 1932-36-40-44 of Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt gave the Democrats dominance, though in domestic issues the Conservative coalition generally controlled Congress from 1938 to 1964. The activist New Deal promoted American liberalism, anchored in a New Deal Coalition of specific liberal groups, especially ethno-religious minorities (Catholics, Jews, African Americans), white Southerners, well-organized labor unions, big city machines, intellectuals, and liberal farm groups. Opposition Republicans were split between a conservative wing, led by Senator Robert A. Taft, and a more successful moderate wing led by President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

The period climaxed with Lyndon B. Johnson's smashing electoral defeat of conservative Republican presidential candidate Barry Goldwater in 1964; in no other election since 1944 has the Democratic party received more than 50.1% of the Presidential vote. The Democratic coalition divided in 1948 and 1968, in the latter election allowing the Republican candidate Richard Nixon to take the White House. Democrats kept control of the House until they lost it in the 1994 election. For the next twelve years the GOP was in control by small majorities, until the Democrats recaptured the chamber in 2006. The Democrats held the Senate until 1980; since then the two parties have traded control of the Senate back and forth by small majorities.

[edit] Sixth Party System?

This periodization of American history was published in 1955. Since then, much of the work published on the subject has been political scientists explaining the events of their own time as the imminent breakup of the Fifth Party System, and the installation of a new one. However, no decisive electoral event, shifting both Presidential and Congressional control, has occurred since 1932. This idea was particularly popular in the 1970s, specifying dates as early as 1960; it became popular again in the first decade of the twenty-first century. Other current writing on the Fifth Party System expresses admiration of its longevity: the first four systems lasted about 30 years each, which would have implied that the early twenty-first century should see a seventh party system. It is also possible, as argued in (Jensen 1981) and elsewhere, that the party system has given way, not to a new party system, but to a period of dealignment in politics. Previous party systems ended with the dominant party losing two consecutive House elections by large margins, with a presidential election coinciding with or immediately following (in 1896) the second house election. But no such pattern has been seen since 1930/1932.

[edit] References

John H. Aldrich (1999). "Political Parties in a Critical Era". American Politics Research 27 (1): 9–32. DOI:10.1177/1532673X99027001003.
Allswang, John M. New Deal and American Politics (1978), statistical analysis of votes
Andersen, Kristi. The Creation of a Democratic Majority, 1928-1936 (1979), statistical analysis of polls
Bibby, John F. "Party Organizations, 1946-1996," in Byron E. Shafer, ed. Partisan Approaches to Postwar American Politics, (1998)
Cantril, Hadley and Mildred Strunk, eds. Public Opinion, 1935-1946 (1951), massive compilation of public opinion polls
Fraser, Steve, and Gary Gerstle, eds. The Rise and Fall of the New Deal Order, 1930-1980 (1990), essays on broad topics.
Geer, John G. "New Deal Issues and the American Electorate, 1952-1988," Political Behavior, 14#1 (Mar., 1992), pp. 45-65 online at JSTOR
Gershtenson, Joseph. "Mobilization Strategies of the Democrats and Republicans, 1956-2000," Political Research Quarterly Vol. 56, No. 3 (Sep., 2003), pp. 293-308 in JSTOR
Hamby, Alonzo. Liberalism and Its Challengers: From F.D.R. to Bush (1992).
Jensen, Richard. "The Last Party System: Decay of Consensus, 1932-1980," in The Evolution of American Electoral Systems (Paul Kleppner et al. eds.) (1981) pp 219-225,
Ladd Jr., Everett Carll with Charles D. Hadley. Transformations of the American Party System: Political Coalitions from the New Deal to the 1970s 2nd ed. (1978).
Leuchtenburg, William E. In the Shadow of FDR: From Harry Truman to George W. Bush (2001)
Manza, Jeff and Clem Brooks; Social Cleavages and Political Change: Voter Alignments and U.S. Party Coalitions, Oxford University Press, 1999
Manza, Jeff; "Political Sociological Models of the U.S. New Deal" Annual Review of Sociology, 2000 pp 297+
Milkis, Sidney M. and Jerome M. Mileur, eds. The New Deal and the Triumph of Liberalism (2002)
Milkis, Sidney M. The President and the Parties: The Transformation of the American Party System Since the New Deal (1993)
Robinson, Edgar Eugene. They Voted for Roosevelt: The Presidential Vote, 1932-1944 (1947) tables of votes by county
Shafer, Byron E. and Anthony J. Badger, eds. Contesting Democracy: Substance and Structure in American Political History, 1775-2000 (2001)
Sternsher, Bernard. "The New Deal Party System: A Reappraisal," Journal of Interdisciplinary History v.15#1 (Summer, 1984), pp. 53-81 JSTOR
Sternsher, Bernard. "The Emergence of the New Deal Party System: A Problem in Historical Analysis of Voter Behavior," Journal of Interdisciplinary History, v.6#1 (Summer, 1975), pp. 127-149 online at JSTOR
Sundquist, James L. Dynamics of the Party System: Alignment and Realignment of Political Parties in the United States (1983)

[edit] External Links

John C. Green and Paul S. Herrnson. "Party Development in the Twentieth Century: Laying the Foundations for Responsible Party Government?" (2000) online version

Political eras of the United States of America