The Two Party System

The U.S. has come a long way since our Founding Fathers created the Constitution. Throughout our history, we have been dominated by a Two Party system. This Two Party system has changed significantly since their creation. The U.S. has had six party eras, the first era was predominantly the federalist vs anti-federalist debate about whether the states or federal government should hold more power. The Democratic party started to gain traction in the second party era. While the Republican party gained its traction in the Third Party era with Abraham Lincoln. Geographically speaking, in the Third Party era, Republicans were the north and western states. Democrats on the other hand, were southern pro-slavery states. Since the Third Party era, Republicans …show more content…
To believe that every public policy problem only has two approaches is nonsense in my opinion. This is exactly what our two party system portrays. Most problems have a range of different possible solutions. A good way to see if the parties are representative of the people is to look at the voter turnout. The U.S. is among one of the last industrialized nations when it comes to the participation rate in elections. What is the main factor in making people not vote? I don’t believe the two major parties represent the public. For example, people who live in red states won’t bother voting because they don’t think the state will ever be blue. People feel their vote does not matter, because they believe the electoral college decides who the president will be not the voters. There has been four cases in the United States history when the popular vote has lost. In 1824, Andrew Jackson when he won the popular vote, but lost the electoral vote. Each case was similar in that they won the popular vote and lost with the electoral college vote. Thus, giving people the reason to believe it does not matter what the public votes on because it 's up to the electoral college. This belief isn’t the only reason people don’t go out and vote. Some states actually make it difficult for certain groups to vote. For instance, if you commit a felony you are no longer allowed to vote until you are released from prison. Another restriction voters’ might face when trying to vote is that they will need a current state voter I.D. Currently, 31 states require this in order for you to vote. The main reason Americans are not voting is because of voter restrictions and the belief that their vote does not