THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, June 16, 1996 TAG: 9606140717
SECTION: COMMENTARY PAGE: J1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: By TONY WHARTON, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 140 lines
``If I could not go to Heaven but with a party, I would not go there at all,'' Thomas Jefferson said of political parties.
It was a popular view among leaders of the American Revolution. They had seen the bitter schism in England between Whigs and Tories. That was not how the founders wanted to pick leaders in the new nation.
That didn't last. The differences of the earliest constitutional conventions began playing themselves out on the national stage. Jefferson, opposing some of George Washington's policies, reluctantly became the nucleus around which formed a cluster of like-minded men, ultimately the new ``Democratic-Republican'' Party.
The Federalist party developed in defense of the administration, and the basis was established for the two-party system. Since the 1850s, the nation's politics have revolved around two parties, unchanged at least in name, the Democrats and the Republicans.
Is this the best system? How should we discuss our common concerns and pick our leaders? What can parties do best?
Essentially, the history of political parties in America is animated by the tension between inclusion and exclusion.
Put another way, the parties veer between being more like clubs, which accept only the ``like-minded,'' and more like big tents, incorporating more diversity.
The two views are playing out now in the modern Republican Party's struggle over abortion. Presumed nominee Bob Dole is leaning toward a ``big tent,'' seeking tolerance of pro-choice Republicans. But Pat Buchanan and others insist the party must take a principled stand that is more exclusive.
Elsie Barnes, dean of the school of social sciences at Norfolk State University, said the push toward more inclusiveness is political common sense.
``It's the nature of American politics,'' she said. ``In order to be successful you have to play to the middle, that's where the most votes are.''
Patrick McSweeney disagrees. The Richmond lawyer and immediate past chairman of the state Republican Party argues we need strong parties, offering a clear choice, in order to deal with the nation's pressing problems. This would give definition to discussions of issues and candidates.
He's had plenty of reason to think it over. In Virginia, Republicans have just finished a divisive primary that revolved around issues of conscience and loyalty to party. In this case, the big tent triumphed over the club.
And the state has allowed the Virginia Independent Party the rare privilege of placing candidates on statewide ballots without going through a petition process.
Louis Herrink, chairman of the VIP, said the two major parties ``are still fighting over who they are and who they are going to try to represent.
``The problem is of long standing, a century-old problem. The two parties that have dominated politics in that time have not been focused.''
Yes, but do they still work? James R. Sweeney, associate professor of history at Old Dominion University, thinks so: ``I think the country's been blessed. For all their faults, the parties serve as a structure.''
Within that structure, Sweeney said, people are able to debate knotty problems - notably including Prohibition and civil rights - in a more informal setting than Congress or the state legislatures, and begin to work through responses to them.
Patrick McSweeney said, ``People don't appreciate the need for and the role of parties. They don't do a particularly good job right now. But that doesn't mean we don't need them.''
McSweeney sees strong parties as promoting accountability, by which people can bring a politician back in line, and giving everyone a tangible role in politics and government.
Historians say many forces have weakened the ability of parties to do those things in this century. The parallel popularity of television campaigning, and using primaries rather than conventions to nominate candidates, for instance, takes power away from party structures and allows candidates to communicate directly with voters.
Also, widely reported scandals like Watergate tend to sully the parties' reputations.
Thus, several studies since World War II have shown more and more people identifying themselves as independents rather than members of either major party.
When pressure builds up between inclusion and exclusion, our two-party system tends to let off steam by forming third parties. The weakening of the parties has accelerated that movement.
The turn of the century saw the rise of the Populists, whose strength was drawn from rural farmers, and the Progressives, generally urban reformers, and later Theodore Roosevelt's ``Bull Moose'' Party, formed largely on the strength of his personality.
In 1968, George Wallace ran for president from the American Independent Party.
Now, the Reform Party is the latest example.
Cornell University professor Theodore Lowi thinks the two-party system would collapse without legal reinforcements.
``The two-party system is on IV,'' he said. ``They're brain-dead. If you pull off their life support, which is the state laws that prevent third parties from being formed, they'd die.''
Lowi thinks two parties are impossible to sustain today because the nation is too diverse.
``They no longer can respond to the multiracial pluralism in the United States,'' he said. The debate over single-member, minority-based districts, he said, illustrates the failures of an exclusively two-party system.
Those difficulties would be resolved, he said, if the U.S. moved to a more parliamentary-like system with multimember districts that would accommodate more voices.
The national electoral college and our winner-take-all elections, which throw no scraps to consistently minority parties, tend to reinforce a two-party system. In Israel and some other democracies, small parties receive a share of seats equal to the votes they draw.
Advocates of third parties, like Lowi, feel a strong alternative would wake up the Democrats and Republicans to pay attention to issues they now give only lip service.
Third-party movements do sometimes produce change. The legacy of the reform-minded Progressives, for instance, includes the creation of the city manager, considered a professional who could take city administration out of partisan politics.
McSweeney said the tangible response to Ross Perot shows Americans are aware of the problems facing the country and want politicians to grapple with them. But he doesn't think a third party is the way to do it.
``The reason I get so impassioned about it is that we face a five-trillion-dollar national debt,'' he said. ``We've got a real trying time on our hands, and we don't have a lot of time to deal with it.
``We need a disciplined, organized party with an agenda. One of the parties has got to step forward and say this is the agenda we need. It ain't every man for himself.''
Lowi is encouraged by the vigor of the Reform Party, but he feels they're going about it all wrong.
``They're playing the two-party game,'' he said. ``All that talk about how we need to look out for future generations is bull. They need to be talking about the importance of a third party in American politics, and showing people that a vote for a third-party candidate is not thrown away, but an investment.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photos
George Washington
Federalist Party
Thomas Jefferson
Founder, Democratic Republican Party
Theodore Roosevelt
"Bull Moose" Progressive Party
KEYWORDS: POLITICAL PARTY by CNB