First Party System

(noun)

The First Party System is a model of American politics used by political scientists and historians to periodize the political party system existing in the United States between roughly 1792 and 1824.

Related Terms

Examples of First Party System in the following topics:

  • Political Parties from 1800–1824

    • The First Party System refers to political party system existing in the United States between roughly 1792 and 1824.
    • The First Party System is a model of American politics used by political scientists and historians to periodize the political party system existing in the United States between roughly 1792 and 1824.
    • The First Party System ended during the Era of Good Feelings (1816–1824), as the Federalists shrank to a few isolated strongholds and the Republicans lost unity.
    • In 1824-28, as the Second Party System emerged, the Republican Party split into the Jacksonian faction, which became the modern Democratic Party in the 1830s, and the Henry Clay faction, which was absorbed by Clay's Whig Party.
    • Distinguish the issues and policies supported by the first political parties and identify the central elements of the First Party System

  • The Transfer of Power between the Federalists and the Republicans

    • The First Party System defined the development of the first U.S. political parties: the Federalists and the Democrat-Republicans.
    • The First Party System describes a model used by political scientists and historians to frame United States politics from approximately 1792 to 1824.
    • The First Party System is not only a tool of analysis for social scientists, but also, bore significance to contemporaries, who analyzed the implications behind this divergence of political organizations.
    • For instance, Thomas Jefferson provided an analytical outline of the party system in 1798:
    • Social scientists label the end of the First Party System during the Era of Good Feelings (1816–1824), as the Federalists shrank to a few isolated strongholds and the Republicans lost party unity.

  • The Two-Party System

    • The modern political party system in the U.S. is a two-party system dominated by the Democratic Party and the Republican Party.
    • The First Party System of the United States featured the Federalist Party and the Democratic-Republican Party (Anti-Federalist).
    • The Fourth Party System, 1896 to 1932, retained the same primary parties as the Third Party System, but saw major shifts in the central issues of debate.
    • There are two main reasons winner–takes–all systems lead to a two-party system.
    • First, the weaker parties are pressured to form an alliance, sometimes called a fusion, attempting to become big enough to challenge a large dominant party and, in so doing, gain political clout in the legislature.

  • The Second Party System

    • The Second Party System existed in the United States from about 1828 to 1854.
    • For the first time, politics assumed a central role in voters' lives.
    • The Second Party System reflected and shaped the political, social, economic, and cultural currents of the Jacksonian Era until succeeded by the Third Party System in 1854.
    • This period marked the first time two-party politics were extended to the South and West, both of which had previously been one-party regions.
    • The Second Party System was also the first, and remains the only, party system in which the two major parties remained on about equal footing in every region.

  • Political Parties

    • Sweden has a multi-party system, with numerous parties in which no one party often has a chance of gaining power alone, and parties must work with each other to form coalition governments.
    • A multi-party system is a system in which three or more political parties have the capacity to gain control of government separately or in coalition.
    • If the government includes an elected Congress or Parliament the parties may share power according to Proportional Representation or the First-past-the-post system.
    • First-past-the-post is not conducive to a proliferation of parties, and naturally gravitates toward a two-party system, in which only two parties have a real chance of electing their candidates to office.
    • The United States is an example of where there may be a multi-party system but that only two parties have ever formed government.

  • Ideological Third Parties and Splinter Parties

    • America's democratic system is predominantly a two party system.
    • A third party is any party that supports a candidate for election other than the two major political parties; at the current moment, a third party would be any party other than the Democratic and Republican parties.
    • Since third party candidates do not have a legitimate chance of winning national election given the structure of the current system, most third parties do not tend to try to pursue moderate voters and instead stay close to their ideological roots.
    • The three main third parties are the Libertarian Party, the Green Party, and the Constitution Party .
    • An example of a small right-wing third party would be the America First Party.

  • The Modern Era of Political Parties

    • Modern politics in the United States is a two-party system dominated by the Democratic Party and the Republican Party.
    • Modern politics in the United States is a two-party system dominated by the Democratic Party and the Republican Party.
    • The Democratic Party is one of two major political parties in the United States, and is the oldest political party in the world.
    • The other major contemporary political party in the United States is the Republican Party.
    • Founded in 1854 by Northern anti-slavery expansion activists and modernizers, the Republican Party rose to prominence with the election of Abraham Lincoln, the first Republican to campaign on the Northern principles of anti-slavery.

  • Party Identification

    • People who identify with a political party either declare their allegiance by joining the party or show their support through regular party-line voting at the polls.
    • People can easily switch their party affiliation or distance themselves from parties entirely.
    • In 2000, more people identified as independents (40 percent of the voting population) than affiliated with either the Democratic (34 percent) or Republican (24 percent) parties for the first time in history.
    • As voter identification with political parties has declined, so has dedication to the two-party system.
    • Still, the two-party system continues to dominate the political process as a viable multiparty alternative has not emerged .

  • Checking the Power of the Governing Party

    • The Democratic and Republican Parties can check the power of the governing party by holding seats in the legislative branch of the government.
    • While the Democratic Party occupied the executive branch, the Republican Party held the majority of seats in the legislative branch.
    • This division of parties between the executive and legislative branches impairs the ability of the president to enact policies, since the legislative branch must first approve these policies.
    • While the checks and balances system between the executive, legislative, and judicial branches prevents any one branch from becoming tyrannical, this system has also been criticized for maintaining the status quo in government rather than promoting changes.
    • Describe the relationship between the political parties and a system of checks and balances

  • Political Parties

    • The type of electoral system is a major factor in determining the type of political party system.
    • In single-party systems, one political party is legally allowed to hold effective power.
    • Congress are examples of two-party systems.
    • Multi-party systems are systems in which more than two parties are represented and elected to public office.
    • The United States Congress is an example of a two-party system of governance.