The AP has a nice article on what is a consistent trend throughout voter history — the rise of third parties at times when voters are unhappy. The article discusses Governor’s race in NJ between Democratic Incumbent Jon Corzine, Republican candidate Chris Christie, and Independent Chris Daggett. In NY’s 23rd District, the GOP candidate (Dede Scozzafava) was forced out of the race by surging Conservative Party candidate, Doug Hoffman. Scozzafava then endorsed her former Democratic opponent, Bill Owens.
Does this mean America is headed for a new era, the end of the two party stranglehold on political power? Sadly, I’ll have to say no.
Now, I’m not saying no because I hate third parties — quite the opposite. If my young voting record is any indication (and my independent party affiliation), I advocate third parties aggressively. However, I’m a realist above all, and while I believe that a few third party candidates may make inroads here or there, this will not be a permanent phenomenon.
Historically, third parties have been strongest when there is discontent in the nation. Look at Teddy Roosevelt, who harnessed the power of the Progressive movement into his Bull-Moose party, fighting with former friend and Republican candidate William Howard Taft, paving the way for a Wilson presidency (Wilson won with only 41.8% of the popular vote).
George C. Wallace took 46 electoral votes in 1968, playing at divisions in the electorate over de-segregation (Wallace opposed de-segregation). Nixon would win that election with 301 electoral votes, but, interestingly, only little more than half of the popular vote (he got 31,710,470 votes whereas Vice President and Democratic candidate Hubert Humphrey got 30,898,055, and George Wallace got 9,906,473). An incredibly close race with a third party siphoning votes by playing to the divisive issue of the time.
Looking back to 1948, Strom Thurmond won 39 electoral votes as the segregationist, socially conservative Dixiecrat, again taking advantage of the racially divisive time period. Thurmond carried Southern states, most likely taking votes from Democratic candidate Harry S Truman (back when the South was solidly Democratic, pre-LBJ days) who still clinched a narrow victory over Thomas Dewey.
More recently, in 1992, Ross Perot gained about 19% of the popular vote, but no electoral votes. Perot’s focus on the economy, during a recession and after 12 years of Reagan-Bush, gained him a large amount of votes, even after he withdrew and then re-entered the race. However, and this is instructive as to the lot of third parties in America, Perot’s 1996 run for the Presidency was decidedly less successful. Why? Because Clinton absorbed many of the Perot voters with his economic agenda. Perot was the answer to growing discontent with both parties (the Republicans in power — Reagan and Bush — had more than tripled the national debt and the economy was in recession, and the Democrats were also saddled with a reputation of big government and larger spending), but once Clinton took office as a “New Democrat” and began the process of balancing the budget and leading the way out of recession, many voters who were discontented with the two main parties then supported Clinton. In effect, he neutralized the Perot voters, and brought them over to his side for the 1996 election.
This is the historic role of third parties in America — the answer to discontent with both the two major parties. They run, they siphon off enough votes to make the major parties recognize the growing movement in America, and then the major parties absorb their views to neutralize them and pacify the electorate. When was the last time you saw someone running on the Bull-Moose or Dixiecrat or Know-Nothing ticket? These movements don’t often survive past a few elections at the most, because their views have been taken on by one of the major parties (Perot) or their views become out of step or fall out of favor (such as the racist Dixiecrat and Know-Nothing parties). Or because people are frightened to vote third party.
Which leads us to the 2000 election. Discontent spread over various things (the Monica Lewinsky affair and Gore’s subsequent attempts to disassociate himself with Clinton, the false image of Gore perpetuated by opponents (for instance, he never said he invented the internet), and the conservative bend of the Clinton-Gore “New Democrats’” on various economic issues like deregulation and free trade), which lead to an extremely tight race in which Gore won the popular vote of the American people, but lost the election after the Supreme Court decided Bush won Florida. Ralph Nader, running as a Green Party candidate, was the answer to much of this dissatisfaction. He posed a progressive alternative to the Gore “New Democrat” and the “Reagan Conservative” Bush, and won 2.74% of the popular vote.
Viewed as the spoiler that caused Gore to lose (though Gore actually won the popular vote, as noted above), Nader would have no substantial effect in later elections. Essentially, I believe, the thought process became “a third party cannot win and can only hurt my second choice candidate, so I have to vote for one of the two major parties”. Also, the 2000 did not have the extremely large issues that dominate politics today (terrorism and the economy — the 2000 election was pre-9/11 and the economy was not in a recession). The stakes may seem higher now than they did in 2000.
Finally, as Ralph Nader has noted before (I’ll search for the link to the interview), it is extremely difficult to unify a third party, which (like any other party) boasts an intellectual diversity of members. Splintered into various segments, often on a state level instead of a national level, a party may be successful in gaining some elected seats here or there, but without a unifying force it probably won’t translate to a broader single movement that will redefine the political spectrum.
Looking at what has occurred before as a guide, these third party candidates may have scattered success as voters become disillusioned with the Obama Administration but are stilling unwilling to vote for the contemporary Republican Party (dominated as it is by its radical elements — think Limbaugh, Palin, ‘birthers’, and ‘death panelists’), but they will most likely not change the political landscape in the long-term. If the economy picks up, and things start looking better (or if the Republican Party retains its extremist views), these voters may return to the Democratic fold. If the Republican Party recreates itself into a party of intellectual conservatism and jettisons its fringe elements and evangelical base that frighten away moderate voters, then it will likely gain these independent-voters.
