Talk:US History/Third Parties

Unofficial parties

 * During the revolutionary war, two unofficial parties can be said to've existed, the patriots and the loyalists.
 * During the time of the Constitutional convention, two unofficial parties can be said to've existed, the federalists and the antifederalists.
 * There were still no official parties as of the presidential election of 1788–89, although the federalist and antifederalist factions were still active. Both factions supported the idea of Washington being president, so the real contest was for vice president.
 * Following the election of Washington, the two factions that were prominent were the federalists (lead by Alexander Hamilton), and the so-called "anti-Administration party" (led by James Madison and Thomas Jefferson). Antifederalists naturally gravitated to the latter.

Official parties

 * Hamilton began organising the Federalists into an official political party.
 * Likewise, Jefferson began organising the antifederalist party and other anti-administration party into an official political party, which he called the Republican Party. (Note that this is a totally different party than today's Republican Party.)
 * Thus, by the early 1790s, the two official parties were the Hamiltonian Federalist Party and the Jeffersonian Republican Party.
 * The first political platform in America was the Republican Platform of 1800, adopted in congressional caucus.
 * During Madison's and Monroe's administrations, more and more federalists began join the Republican Party. In 1816, the Federalists didn't officially nominate anyone, although many Federalists supported New York Senator Rufus King.  In 1820, the Federalists didn't have anyone as a presidential nominee (although they did field Richard Stockton for vice president).  By 1824, the Federalist Party has dissolved, leaving only one major party: the Republican Party.

The Republicans split into factions

 * Since there was only one major political party in 1824, factions started to prominently emerge, including the democratic faction (led by Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren) and the nationalist faction (led by Henry Clay and John Quincy Adams). Those who had been federalists tended to prefer the national faction.
 * By the 1828 election, the Clay faction of the Republican Party began calling itself the "national Republicans" in order to emphasise its nationalistic agenda.
 * During the 1832 election, National Republican Party was an official political party, run by Henry Clay, and truly separate from the Republican Party. While the Jacksonian faction was still officially named the Republican Party, it referred to itself as the Democratic Republican Party in order to distinguish itself from National Republican Party
 * In addition to the National Republican Party, the Nullifier Party (led by John C. Calhoun) had also splintered off from the Republican Party. (Although John Floyd did not run for president, the Nullifier Party supported him, and South Carolina gave its eleven electoral votes to him.)
 * Eighteen thirty-two also saw the first time the Anti-Masonic Party had fielded a presidential candidate.
 * Thus, the four notable parties in 1832 were:
 * The Republican Party,
 * The National Republican Party,
 * The Anti-Masonic Party, and
 * The Nullifier Party.
 * By the mid 1830s, the Republicans were referring to themselves as the Democratic Party, although the term “Democratic Republicans” was also often used. (The party has been ofﬁcially calling itself the Democratic Party ever since 1844.)

1836

 * By 1836, the National Republicans had transformed itself into the Whig Party (led by Henry Clay). As the Nullifier Party and the Anti-Masonic Party had no national prominence outside of Congress, we were back to having two major parties:
 * The Democratic Republican Party and
 * The Whig Party.
 * Also in 1836, the Jeffersonian Equal Rights Party (often referred to as the "Locofoco Party") split from the New York Democratic Party, which had strayed from its Jeffersonian roots. Later, during the Van Buren administration, many of the Locofocos reafﬁliated with the Democratic Party.

1840–1848

 * In 1840, the Anti-Masonic Party supported the Whig William Henry Harrison for President.
 * But, in 1840, we did see the emergence of the abolitionist Liberty Party, meaning we now had three notable parties:
 * The Democratic Republican Party,
 * The Whig Party, and
 * The Liberty Party.
 * (Neither the Conservative Party nor the Law and Order Party ever fielded presidential nominees.)


 * Because the the anti-immigrant, anti-Catholic American Republican Party did not field a presidential nominee in 1844, it was again these three parties that were involved in 1844 in the presidential race:
 * The Democratic Party,
 * The Whig Party, and
 * The Liberty Party.
 * In 1848, the the Salmon P. Chase faction of the Liberty Party split, fearing that the Liberty Party was moving in a puritanical direction. This faction formed a new party, the Free Soil Party, which greatly appealed to the antislavery (or "barnburner") faction of the Democratic Party (as well as the "conscience" faction of the Whig Party).
 * (The American Republican Party had changed its name to the Native American Party (although it was often called the Know Nothing Party), but it had nominated Zachary Taylor, who ran as a Whig.)


 * So, the four parties actually involved in the 1848 presidential race were:
 * The Democratic Party,
 * The Whig Party,
 * The Free Soil Party, and
 * The Liberty Party.
 * The term "spoiler" came out of this election. Democrats called the Free Soil Party the "Free Spoiler" Party because the Free Soil Party, which gained more than 10 percent of the vote, appealed so greatly to antislavery Democrats.

1852

 * In 1852, the six parties involved in the presidential race were:
 * The Democratic Party,
 * The Whig Party,
 * The Free Soil Party,
 * The Liberty Party,
 * The Native American Party (a.k.a. the "Know Nothings"), and
 * The Southern Rights Party.
 * (The Union Party had nominated someone, but he died before the election.)

allixpeeke (discuss • contribs) 13:05, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

The Liberty Party
There is a good deal of information about the Liberty Party here, including links to party platforms and other documents. This may be a useful resource. allixpeeke (discuss • contribs) 03:02, 29 January 2015 (UTC)