The two-party system is becoming the United States’ undoing
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Senators and others stay in office for years, becoming less concerned with getting things done and working for their constituents. They are bankrolled and gerrymander districts to secure re-election time and time again.’
When the foundations of the US government were laid, both in the declaration of independence in 1776 and the constitutional convention of 1787, there was no mention of political factions or political parties as we call them today. There are many reasons for this, the main one being the Founding Fathers’ fear of tyranny emerging and the system rupturing beneath them due to factional interests.
However, it is not quite that simple. Many of the founding fathers, astute scholars of human nature, recognised the inevitability of factions. This inevitability became a reality when the fracturing of the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists emerged around the figures of Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson respectively. This division, that eventually led to the formation of the Republican and Democratic parties, were not seen as particularly negative in the long-term. After all, without healthy debate America risked falling to the power of one man or a narrow group of men; exactly what the fathers of America were trying to avoid.
Long into the present day, the federal system of the United States was the envy of the world. Separation of powers, and extremists unable to gather the broad coalition of support needed to win – all of that seemed to be the way things were and would remain. That was until, you guessed it, Donald Trump. Suddenly, a man so bombastic and offensive to many held the Presidency and his party continued to succeed on a Congressional level. Even with the Republican Party and Donald Trump facing huge challenges to win 2020 and beyond, the era of Trump has caused the two-party system to go from something stable to something repugnant and divisive.
It would be foolish to say the problem begins and ends with one man, however. America’s system has been broken for decades and that frustration of feeling voiceless is what gives populists like Trump power. The landmark Supreme Court case, Citizens United vs. the FEC, ruled that money is speech and that the restriction of campaign finance was a violation of the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights on the right to free speech. Politicians who already hold such huge influence and power being told that they can no longer buy out elections with ridiculous amounts of money does not seem particular unreasonable to me. For elections to be competitive, anyone with the know how and the funds should be able to stand for office and win. But the whole country is in the iron grip of a two-party goliath held up by Super PACs, lobbyists and a slim number of party members – many of whom are discontented themselves. That does not help free speech, it hurts it.
Senators and others stay in office for years, becoming less concerned with getting things done and working for their constituents. They are bankrolled and gerrymander districts to secure re-election time and time again. Because of this stale nature of politics in the US, the two sides of the aisle do nothing but mud sling and refuse to work with each other any longer to achieve anything constructive. This in turn goes to the citizens who become more bitterly divided by the issues of the day, with Black Lives Matter and other ‘woke’ groups fanning the flames with riots and curfews now common; which doesn’t help when the country already has a pandemic and economic hardship to cope with.
The President must be a distinguished leader, someone who can unite the country and work with Congress to fix this broken system. It may seem unlikely to some, but with the US in such chaos and a heated election around the corner, things could go from bad to worse. The Founding Fathers would be turning in their graves, something must be done to save the United States from a two-party system that is quickly becoming their downfall.
