xviii
Preface
It is little wonder, therefore, that both of our major political parties are
also factionalized, often lacking any unity of thought or direction. They
both have their liberal and conservative wings, and to the consternation
of many seem unable much of the time to agree among themselves on
policies or candidates, or to present a united front to the electorate. Ideological purity is surely not one of the chief attributes of American political parties. The same, of course, cannot be said of the highly disciplined
parties of the parliamentary democracies, whose elected officials invariably follow ‘‘the party line’’ and rarely cross over to vote with the opposition.
What explains these peculiarities of the American party system? The
answer, in large part, lies in the Constitution—a constitution that does
not even mention political parties or acknowledge their existence. Yet it
is the case that our political parties often look and behave as they do because of our constitutional system. More specifically, the peculiar structural and behavioral pattern of party politics in the United States may be
traced directly to the ubiquitous principle of limited government that
shapes, permeates, and protects every article of the Constitution. It was
fear of power, especially concentrated power, that motivated the Framers
to draft a constitution that limits power by fragmenting, dispersing, and
counterbalancing it. One of the first foreign observers to understand all
of this was James Bryce, a Scottish diplomat and scholar, who noted in
his famous commentaries, The American Commonwealth (1888), that ‘‘the
want of concentration of power in the legal government is reflected in the
structure of the party system.’’
At a more fundamental level, the Constitution reflects the intent of the
Framers to make it difficult, if not impossible, for any single interest
group, including one representing a popular majority, to gain absolute
power over the whole nation and impose its will at the expense of other
interests or groups. The political regime established by the Constitution
is therefore decentralized, and nowhere in the system is there a single locus of concentrated power. Hence it is the federal structure of our Constitution, which divides power between the national and State governments, that best explains why each party is a loose confederation of State
and local parties rather than a unitary organization of one central party.
Federalism produces a highly decentralized political system encompass-