Second Party System

Examples of Second Party System in the following topics:

• The Second Party System

  • Supporters of Jackson called themselves Democrats or the Democracy, giving birth to the Democratic Party and thus inaugurating the Second Party System.
  • The Second Party System existed in the United States from about 1828 to 1854.
  • The Second Party System reflected and shaped the political, social, economic, and cultural currents of the Jacksonian Era until succeeded by the Third Party System in 1854.
  • The Second Party System was also the first, and remains the only, party system in which the two major parties remained on about equal footing in every region.
  • Summarize the origins, development, and key characteristics of the Second Party System

• Partisan Politics

  • The Gilded party era was characterized by intense voter interest, routinely high voter turnout, and unflinching party loyalty.
  • The Third Party System is a term of periodization used by historians and political scientists to describe a period in American political history from about 1854 to the mid-1890s that featured profound developments in issues of nationalism, modernization, and race.
  • This period is defined by its contrast with the eras of the Second Party System and the Fourth Party System.
  • Under the Second and Third Party Systems, parties financed their campaigns through patronage; now civil service reform was undercutting that revenue and entirely new, outside sources of funding became critical.
  • Party loyalty itself weakened as voters were switching between parties much more often.

• The Transfer of Power between the Federalists and the Republicans

  • The First Party System defined the development of the first U.S. political parties: the Federalists and the Democrat-Republicans.
  • The First Party System describes a model used by political scientists and historians to frame United States politics from approximately 1792 to 1824.
  • For instance, Thomas Jefferson provided an analytical outline of the party system in 1798:
  • Social scientists label the end of the First Party System during the Era of Good Feelings (1816–1824), as the Federalists shrank to a few isolated strongholds and the Republicans lost party unity.
  • In 1824-1828, as the Second Party System emerged, the Republican Party split into the Jacksonian faction, which became the modern Democratic Party in the 1830s, and the Henry Clay faction, which was absorbed by Clay's Whig Party.

• Jackson and the Democratic Party

  • The modern Democratic Party arose in the 1830s out of factions from the largely disbanded Democratic-Republican Party.
  • The modern Democratic Party was formed in the 1830s from former factions of the Democratic-Republican Party, which had largely collapsed by 1824.
  • The spirit of Jacksonian Democracy animated the party from the early 1830s to the 1850s, shaping the Second Party System, with the Whig Party the main opposition.
  • During his presidency, Polk lowered tariffs, set up a sub-treasury system, and began and directed the Mexican-American War, in which the United States acquired much of the modern-day American Southwest.
  • They supported the Independent Treasury (the Jacksonian alternative to the Second Bank of the United States) not as a scheme to quash the special privileges of the Whig monied elite, but as a device to spread prosperity to all Americans.

• The Birth of Political Parties

  • During the early years of the U.S. government, the new republic saw the firm and unexpected establishment of a two-party political system.
  • In contrast, the Democratic-Republicans were a rural, agrarian party.
  • The election of Thomas Jefferson in 1800 marked a success for the Democratic-Republican party and the decline of the Federalist party.
  • The disintegration of the Federalist party seemed to leave only the Democratic-Republican party standing.
  • However, after Monroe left office, new partisan differences flared up, instituting the Second Party System.

• The Election of 1828 and the Character Issue

  • The election marked the rise of Jacksonian democracy on the national stage and the transition from the First Party System, of which Jeffersonian democracy was characteristic, to the Second Party System.
  • Historians debate the significance of the election, with many arguing that it marked the beginning of modern American politics and the formation of the two-party system.
  • The nomination of the Democratic Party was Andrew Jackson, former senator from Tennessee.
  • Jackson's supporters called themselves "Democrats," thus marking the evolution of Jefferson's Democratic-Republican Party into the modern Democratic Party.
  • Adams supporters called themselves "National Republicans," and were antecedents of the Whig Party of the 1830s and, later, the Republican Party.

• Corruption and Reform: Hayes to Harrison

  • The Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act in ended the spoils system at the federal level in 1883.
  • A spoils system (also known as a patronage system) is a practice where a political party, after winning an election, gives government jobs to its voters as a reward for their support and as an incentive to keep working for the party (as opposed to a system of awarding offices on the basis of merit independent of political activity).
  • Proponents denounced the spoils system as corrupt and inefficient.
  • Second, it required entrance exams for aspiring bureaucrats.
  • Before the Civil Service Reform Act (Pendleton Act) was passed in 1883, civil service appointments were given based on a patronage system; that is, those who were loyal to an individual or party were rewarded with government jobs.

• The Republican Alternative

  • The Democratic-Republican Party, was an American political party founded around 1791 by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison.
  • The Republican Party, usually called the Democratic-Republican Party, was an American political party founded about 1791 by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison.
  • It selected presidential candidates through its caucus in Congress, but in the late 1820s, that system broke down with the party split between Andrew Jackson and the incumbent President John Quincy Adams.
  • Under the United States Constitution, each elector cast two votes and the candidate with a majority of the votes was elected president, while the candidate with the second-highest vote became the vice president.
  • This system of balloting was later changed by the 1804 Twelfth Amendment, which created a party ticket (one president and one vice presidential candidate), for which the electoral college had to cast votes, rather than casting votes for individuals.

• Civil Service Reform

  • Hayes took office determined to reform the system of civil service appointments, which had been based on the spoils system since Andrew Jackson was president.
  • Senators of both parties were accustomed to being consulted about political appointments and turned against Hayes.
  • Although he could not convince Congress to outlaw the spoils system, Hayes issued an executive order that forbade federal office holders from being required to make campaign contributions or otherwise taking part in party politics.
  • To enforce the merit system and the judicial system, the law also created the United States Civil Service Commission.
  • Logan asked Hayes to shut down the "star route" rings, a system of corrupt contract profiteering in the Postal Service, and to fire Second Assistant Postmaster-General Thomas J.

• Reform and the Election of 1872

  • Grant had supported a patronage system that allowed Republicans to infiltrate and control state governments.
  • In response to President Grant's federal patronage, in 1870, Senator Carl Schurz from Missouri, a German immigrant and Civil War hero, started a second party known as the Liberal Republicans.
  • These goals were first the destruction of slavery and second the destruction of Confederate nationalism.
  • Then in 1872, the party completely split from the Republican party and nominated New York Tribune editor Horace Greeley as candidate for the Presidency.
  • Horace Greeley was soundly defeated as the candidate of the Liberal Republican Party during the election of 1872.