What factors have led to the relative stability of American party systems throughout the nation’s history? What has led to change most recently?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

For the most part, American voters and politicians are creatures of habit, which leads to long periods of political stability within the parties. However, when critical incidents occur that cause major changes in party leadership, alignment or stability, this can lead to periods of realignment. We can usually predict periods of realignment by examining and analyzing critical elections, which are so important as to change the composition and philosophy of one or both political parties. The last such realignment occurred in 1968, when the Democratic Party became much more liberal and the conservative and moderate Democrats along with conservative Republicans shifted their allegiance to the Republican party. In addition, we saw demographic and geographic changes occur, with the Republican base shifting from the Northeastern United States to the American Southwest. Many argue that the election of 2016 was another such critical election, which may lead to political realignment, particularly within the Republican Party.