COLUMN: Two-party system won’t change
Here’s a friendly warning to our readers: Never ask a political scientist about the two-party system in real life. They won’t be offended or bemused. No, the terrible risk you run is they’ll launch into electrified, incomprehensible babbling about things like single-member-single-district (SMSD) elections, multiparty election thresholds and ruling coalitions and something dreadful-sounding called “Duverger’s Law.”
Send me a message if you manage to get out of that conversation in less than two hours – I’ll be impressed.
But I’ll admit – the reality is that in these rather dry and complicated political theories, we find the explanation for why the U.S. has a rigid two-party system, why third parties year after year fail to accrue any influence, and why our system is frankly unlikely to change.
Let’s have a quick POLS 1100 lesson. The unique configuration of American elections means in almost every race – whether it’s for a U.S. House seat or a U.S. Senate seat or even the presidency – there is one and only one prize at stake in that district or state during that election cycle. Regardless of how many candidates vie for the seat, the one candidate who gets a plurality of the votes – that is, more than anyone else; usually 51 percent or more – will win the only prize.
It comes down to this: there’s no prize for second place in American elections. There was no “second place” for Democrat Scott Howell, who ran unsuccessfully against Senator Orrin Hatch in 2012; there was no “second place” for Mitt Romney, who won about 47 percent of the national vote in the 2012 presidential election – a narrow margin of defeat, but that didn’t matter because it simply wasn’t first place.
In order to even have a shot at claiming coveted first place, a candidate must have the backing of a major political party, for it’s through that party organization that money, campaign ads, volunteers and loyal voters will come. Without the party label and support, few candidates would ever be able to seriously contend for office. And even with a major party endorsement, a candidate may well lose to the other major party candidate.
So what about candidates who don’t affiliate with a major party? “Third” parties – any party other than the Republican and Democratic Parties – don’t have a prayer of being able to sponsor a candidate able to win over 51 percent of the voting public. Third party candidates might eke out 5-10 percent of the vote on a good year – but remember, because there’s no prize for anything but first place in our elections, this marginal support falls by the wayside and third parties never even get a foot in the door.
My conclusion is this: whether we like it or not – and frankly, whether or not it’s the best system – the U.S. is stuck with a two-party system simply by nature of our Constitutional political structure. Perhaps the tone of our debate, then, should shift away from that which we simply cannot change and move toward that which we can do to improve American democracy within the system we have.
– Briana is a senior majoring in political science and president of the USU Democrats. She is an avid road cyclist and a 2013 Truman Scholar. Comments can be sent to Briana at b.bowen@aggiemail.usu.edu.