Slide 1George Washington’s viewWarnings from the Past…Party Money and Elections…What are Political Parties?What do Political Parties Do?History of American Political PartiesSlide 8Duverger’s LawModern American Political PartiesPredict your politics??Red States versus Blue StatesParty PlatformsModern American Political PartiesSlide 15Warnings from the Past…Warnings from the Past…Political PartiesGeorge Washington’s viewLet me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party generally. This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less stifled, controlled, or repressed; but, in those of the popular form, it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy. The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism.... It serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the public administration. It agitates the community with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms, kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection.Warnings from the Past…•There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.~ John Adams, October 2, 1780.- The Works of John Adams, Vol. 9,- Boston, 1854.- pp. 510-11.Party Money and Elections…What are Political Parties?Organizations that nominate candidates under their nameWhat do Political Parties Do?•Nominate candidates under the party label•Coordinate the actions of elected officials•Structure vote choices•Propose alternative policiesHistory of American Political PartiesDuverger’s Law•Plurality rule elections within single-member districts tend to favor a two party systemModern American Political PartiesPredict your politics??•http://time.com/510/can-time-predict-your-politics/Red States versus Blue States•See MAPSParty PlatformsDemocratic platform in 2008 = 26,500 words.Republican platform in 2008 = 23,000 words.*though similar in length, very different in content. What words (frames) would you expect to be emphasized by the two major parties?Modern American Political PartiesThe 2000 U.S. Presidential Election ResultsWarnings from the Past…•I never submitted the whole system of my opinions to the creed of any party of men whatever, in religion, in philosophy, in politics, or in anything else, where I was capable of thinking for myself. Such an addiction is the last degradation of a free and moral agent.~ Thomas Jefferson, March 13, 1789, Letters of Thomas Jefferson, New York, 1984, pp. 940-42.-Warnings from the Past…•Let me … warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party.~ George Washington, Farewell Address, September 19, 1796.•The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism.~ George Washington, Farewell Address, September 19, 1796.•The alternate triumphs of different parties … make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common counsels.~ George Washington, Farewell Address, September 19,