Third Parties Influence in American Politics

Third Parties Influence in American Politics 1
THIRD PARTIES INFLUENCE IN AMERICAN POLITICS
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Third Parties Influence in American Politics 2
Third Parties Influence in American Politics
Do third parties influence American politics? If so, how? If not, why not?
The United States (US) politics operate on a two-party system, where these parties
control the politics of the countries. The two-party system has been to control and influence
voting system in the US and the same parties dominate the elective offices. In the modern
American politics, the two political parties that have conquered the electoral system are
Democratic and Republic parties. Both the Democrats and Republicans are linked to liberal
along with conservative viewpoints correspondingly where the elected persons are connected to
one or two of the viewpoints. The funding, endorsement during the campaigns and the resources
are allotted to the candidates based on the two dominating parties in the US (Wood, 2018, pp.
181). Despite the two parties dominating the political system, third parties in US have little or no
influence. In some instances, the third parties get some elective positions. The third parties in the
US tend to be more ideological, as well as extremist as compared to either Democratic or
Republican parties. Furthermore, because the candidates in the third parties do not posses the
justifiable opportunity of winning the elections with the current political structure, the majority
of the third parties are not interested in pursuing moderate electorates and rather they remain
intimate to their ideological origins. Therefore, third parties do not influence the US political
system (Bartlett, 2010, pp. 1).
The term “third party” refers to the biggest third party in the US political system;
however, in the US, third party refers to any party taking part during elections apart from the two
primary political parties-Democratic along with Republican. There are many third parties in the

Third Parties Influence in American Politics 3
country that have gained some prominence in the US political history. For instance, in history,
the Socialist Party occupied more than 600 mayoral offices where Theodore Roosevelt attained
many votes during his presidential tender as a candidate of the Progressive Party in 1912.
Currently, the known major third parties comprise the Constitution Party, the Green Party and
the Progressive Party, where these third parties do not hold major political offices and have little
influence in American politics (Booth, 2011, pp. 56). In the US, third parties face several hurdles
and in some cases are not permitted on ballots due to the absence of popular support along with
signatures to guarantee a place in ballot based on local laws. The major challenge is
marginalization of the third parties that implies that they are not popular to appeal the
countrywide attention. Hence, these parties cannot raise sufficient finances to carry out their
campaigns and make them popular with the electorates. In terms of numbers, third parties have
been successfully in elections and since 1877; there have been 31 senators, 22 governors, and
111 representatives in the US that originated from third parties (Newman, 2017, pp. 58).
In the US, the three parties have more than 100,000 registered members. Nonetheless,
though these parties are the biggest of the third parties in the US, they only embody the smallest
percentage of the US electorates and they more ideologically inclined as compared to both the
Democrats and Republicans. The Libertarian Party, for instance, promotes laissez-faire
ideologies, small regime, and is being liberal and financial conservative (Miller, 2017, pp. 52).
On the other hand, the Green Party is a progressive party that stresses on environment that
promotes socialism. The Constitution Party is socially, as well as financially conservative party
that is supported by the religious right. Apart from the three major third parties in the US, some
third parties usually promote fringe ideologies and stress ideology and evading speaking to a

Third Parties Influence in American Politics 4
broad base. The American First Party (AFP) is a small-wing third party that is characterized as
pale conservative since they are socially, as well as financially conservative. The American First
Party promotes the ideology of forming a small government by abolishing federal programs like
the Department of Education and has the agenda of cutting taxes and permitting more vigorous
integration of state and church (Lindberg, 2010, pp. 142).
Nonetheless, the third parties has primary role in US politics, but there contribution has
not been that immense. They usually organize along with mobilize a single concern or position,
placing demands on political aspirants from the two major parties to deal with these issues. For
instance, segregationist American Independent Party presidential aspirant, George Wallace,
attained 13.5 per cent of the popular vote during the elections held in 1968. In reaction, the
Republican Party embraced a “Southern Strategy” to triumph the campaign of conventional
Democrats located in the South who were not in favour of the new Civil Rights movements
(Campbell, 2013, pp. 307). Though it is not possible that a third party will attain more votes and
popularity, they have a little influence during an election by taking away some votes from
candidates from major political parties. This trend was witnessed in 2000 election when the
Green Party candidate, Ralph Nader, denied some votes to Al Gore that resulted in the triumph
of George W. Bush as Republican candidate (Lee, 2012, pp. 269).Furthermore, statistics
demonstrate that around 83% of the US citizens consider that there is a major trouble with the
current two-part system in the US. The majority of these citizens claim that they more political
parties to make informed choices rather than those provided by the two leading parties in the US.
Regrettably, the US Constitution fundamentally makes the third parties unviable. Nonetheless,