Broken Politics And Broken Dreams

Many politicians argue that there is a need for institutional reform in the United States—the sole purpose of such reform should be to develop a more efficient system for the state as a whole. However, others argue that there are existing institutions in the United States that are structured efficiently. In order to help determine where an individual will stand on the debate about institutional reform, one must compare the effects of different forms of political institutions with the existing form in the United States. There are three new proposals of reform to discuss for the United States: 1) change in the electoral system for the House of Representatives, 2) change in the executive structure

With these changes, we could fix these problems. If we put other branches in place so multiple groups have the same amount of power. If we change the voting to 58% instead of 100%. If we have it be mandatory that states give money to the government, and let the qualified people have the money they deserve, we could have a functioning

Generally speaking, anyone who lives in the United States of America knows that there are two main political parties—the Republicans and the Democrats. Having two main parties has its advantages and, of course, its disadvantages. For example, in By the People James E. Monroe and Rogan Kersh (301) point out having this type of system creates “predictability and stability.” However, they also declare (301) it can “lead to a gridlock.” This is not a new concept either as there has been a divide since the beginning of both parties. The two parties more often than not disagree on various issues, while rarely agreeing on what is best for the country.

The political system of America is very different from other developed and developing democracies. Most notable is the increased power bestowed on the upper house of the parliament, the extensive power held by the Supreme Court and the dominance demonstrated by only two major parties. In the United States, third parties have the least influence on the world’s most developed democracy’s political structure. In this democracy, people are under the US Constitution of the governmental system as well as state government and other units of local government. Local government entails counties, districts and municipalities. The evolution of the American political party system has come a long way; with Hamilton and Jefferson being regarded as the founder fathers of the modern party system. These were heads of the Federalist and Anti-Federalist groups in the 18th century of American politics. Ever since, the country has maintained a party system that has two main parties that are relatively stable. These are Democrats and Republicans and have remained in contest for election every time since the 1860 presidential elections. Initially, the Republican Party was the dominant party but the Democrats later gained dominance. However, the two parties became closely competitive and neither of them has been notably dominant since the 1970s (O'Connor & Sabato, n.d).

In 1789, the U.S. did not have a two-party system. The two-party system is rooted in the beginnings of the nation itself. The Framers of the Constitution were opposed to political parties. The ratification of the Constitution saw the birth of America's first two parties: the federalists, led by Alexander Hamilton, and the Anti-Federalists, who followed Thomas Jefferson. The nation had only had George Washington, who was President without a party at that time. During George Washington’s two terms, a conflict developed between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, who were both Federalists men. Jefferson challenged Adams under the umbrella of the Democratic - Republican Party. In addition, the Democratic - Republican Party was the first real party that contained the formal beginnings of the present day two-party system. The word Democratic infers to “will of the people”, the word Republican infers to “rule of law” which is defense from possible oppression of the majority. In short, the American party system began as a two-party system. In this essay I will be discussing the why America needs a two-party system, why a multi-system may work for the nation and the conflicts, and how does this political system contributes to the nation and why a two-system is worth the struggle.

The United States is one of the strongest nations in the world. We, as a nation, have learned a lot from other nations. For example, in the 1760’s we learned a lot of what not to do from Britain. America came to be because of citizens, who were known as patriots, that were unhappy with the British government. America gained their independence because of unfair laws passed by the British, such as, the Intolerable Acts, Stamp Act, Townshend Act; and violent acts such as the Boston Massacre.

It does not hurt to reflect upon history and to determine what should and should not be implemented as to correct our previous faults and thus not repeat them in borderline insane process. Furthermore, this presidential election has shaken both political parties as both of them are scrambling for party unity instead of creating other beliefs which resulted in a gathered hate against both political candidates. I proudly state that I have reconsidered my political preference during this election as I am sure others did too. Unfortunately, I firmly believe that political parties are the only way to inspire and gather people with similar beliefs and aspirations as it is the only way we know how to approach politics. The systematic organization of the political process and parties is held to a fault based upon prejudices and predisposed historical follies, from there causes the intolerance of ideology. As what Alexander Hamilton said “If men were angels, government would cease to exist” which poses a paradoxical situation of flawed mankind redirecting other faulted humans as there is bound to lapse of judgement between the ideal representation of government versus vice. There is definitely no easy way as to fix this problem as we are too in depth in it, however the idea

John Adams, one of the founding fathers, wrote that “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” (“Quote by John Adams”). The Two-Party system has been around since the start of America. The Two-Party system is a system that has two parties that the government, or America in this case, has that lead the government or America. At the current time, the two parties are the Republican and Democrat parties. It was created with the idea that everyone can be represented within either of the parties. Even though it does create some representation of the people, the two-party system does not create an equal policy in society because it does not allow people to get far if they are not within either of the two parties, does not allow the idea of having more than two parties, and because it doesn't represent everyone.

There are copious Americans who believe that the political party system is shattering our nation. In my opinion, our nation would not be the nation we are today without political parties. Other than presenting candidates and electoral campaigns to the electorate, political parties perform innumerable tasks to better the United States of America. They serve as institutionalized mediators between our society and duly elected representatives who are responsible for determining and executing legislations. They seek public policy priorities and civic needs and concerns identified by their affiliates and supporters. Political parties educate the people on how the political, electoral system, and general political values work. By doing so, voters are well informed of each party’s stance on specific matters. They also inspire individuals to participate in political decisions and turning their outlooks into policy options for all. Unlike other countries, America is a democratic nation we want our people to freely voice their thoughts and support the party who shares their interest and perspectives. In addition, political parties help to annihilate any unexpected shifts in political trends that hold the ability to disrupt the balance of our government. As we all know our nation is a two -party system that assist in advocating stability in the government, because there will only ever be two

The English Civil War in the 1600’s was fought between two parties in the government, the Tories and the Whigs, that either supported the king or disapproved of him. This violent show of political partisanship may have warned the Founding Fathers that political parties had the power to divide governments and lead to tyranny. Aside from the possibility of leading to a violent power struggle, political parties have the potential to draw away politicians’ loyalty from the American population as a whole to the benefit of their political group. Thomas Jefferson wrote that he never wanted to adhere to a group when he was capable of thinking on his own. He called submitting a whole opinion to a party, “the last degradation for a free and moral agent.” (Hatzenbuehler 32) Arduous bipartisanship also leads to a stalemate in Congress. According to a study by the Brookings Institute, in Congress seventy-five percent of salient issues in 2014 were in gridlock. (Binder 2016) Attitudes become increasingly sharp in politics as the political sides compete, each trying to prove the other a radical. If there were no political parties every member would most likely treat their fellow members with civility in the hopes that they would choose to support mutual

The American system has been widely recognized as a model of democracy and effective governing, but critics argue its flaws in policy making. Founders of the United States made a three branch system, in which they later introduced political parties. At times, the system can be viewed as having poor efficiency in legislation and poor accountability. In our government's system, policies are implemented after completion of a long process of incremental decision making, and that has shaped our own political community and parties.

Everything in life is not perfect whether it concerns humans or even the government. According to Merriam-Webster dictionary, government can be defined as, “the group of people who control and make decisions for a country, state, etc.” Government can be organized in variety of ways, in order to control a civilized society. For example, a government can either be structured as a presidential system or even multi-party parliamentary system. The United States government uses a presidential system in order to govern their nation. However, Professor Christopher S. Allen believes that the United States presidential system contains many flaws. Professor Allen’s reasoning that the multi-party parliamentary system may help overcome the core institutional blockages of the American presidential system is correct because it would result in an effective form of government where voting rates, costly campaigning cost, confusion of roles and political accountability would mend the political structure in United States leading to prosperity for the nation.

Todays government is made up of two powerful parties, the Democrats and the Republicans, and a less influential third party, Independents. The biggest reason the system seems to be broken is because the people within the parties don’t seem to agree on much. This is normally ok because through discourse disagreements can be ironed out, but the two major parties do not seem to want to compromise with each. This creates the gridlock on many issues we see today.

Political parties are in a decline as they lack strong rank and file membership, lack party discipline, establishment of intraparty divisions, and lost many of their traditional functions. They lack strong rank and file membership as the registration process of being a party member has been made significantly easier with voters checking a simple box while voting. Some states do not even require to register to a party, but allows voters to “tend” towards a certain party. Furthermore, they are no party duties that allows voters to be invested in the parties. A lack of party discipline allows voters to do split ticket voting that creates a divided government. Without any punishment by political machines, the voters or politicians are free to not be loyal to their party. Intraparty divisions implements problems within a party itself with the members creating a divide.

The current winner-take-all system is serviceable, but it is prone to polar inversions due to its bipartisan nature. Neither party adequately represents the values of most Americans. Worse, is the fact that most of the votes that go toward an independent or third party candidate are essentially wasted, discouraging voters from selecting such candidates. It is a system which generally makes it difficult for smaller parties to gain influence, and which rarely provides accurate representation to the voters.