Why Do We Have a Two-Party System?
Or, Why Are There No Strong Third
Parties?
"Duverger's
Law"?
-
single-member
districts produce two-party systems
-
limited
empirical support:
Federalism?
-
state-based
organization makes it hard for new, national parties to form
-
limited
empirical support:
Restrictive Ballot Access Rules
-
states
determine rules for appearing on ballot
-
some
states have high "barriers to entry"
o
states
with higher number of electoral votes, dominance of one party, or less
organized parties have stricter ballot access laws (Lewis-Beck & Squire,
1995)
o
e.g.,
in CA, House candidate must submit 150 signatures from eligible voters in
district in 54 days to avoid $1,621.00 filing fee;
o
Senate
candidates must collect 10,000 signature to avoid 3,242.00 fee, and collect
165,573 nominating signatures from registered voters in 60 days; submit
signatures to county officials of voter's county
Campaign Finance Provisions
-
major parties get full matching up to $20
million inflation adjusted dollars ($74.692 million in 2004)
-
major party is a party's whose candidate in
the prior election received 25% or more of the popular vote
-
minor parties get share of major party funds
up to the ratio of their percentage of the vote to the average of the major
party candidates’ percentage of the vote in the last election
-
minor party candidate must have received at least 5% of the popular vote.
-
A
new minor party candidate must gain 5% of vote to be eligible for funding after
election
-
-
get less than 5%....
"Lock-In" by Major Parties
& Media
-
Congressional
committee system has no place for independents
-
Media
covers most popular candidates
-
Debates
restricted to candidates likely to receive at least 5% of vote
Nader and Valtrex Democrats
("It's about suppression")
-
legal challenges to Nader
in swing states in 2004
-
on
ballot in 43 state in 2000; 35 in 2004
-
Ballot Project, Inc. founded to aid local
Democratic parties in finding pro-bono lawyers to challenge Nader
o
in
PA, Reed Smith law firm had up to 10 laywers working
80-hour weeks for
o
over
2 weeks with over 100 volunteers to review Nader
petitions (NYT 19 Aug.2004)
Effects of Third Parties
-
spoiler:
Nader v. Gore in 2000
-
alter
future voting patterns
o
Most
1992 Perot voters turn Republican in 1994, 1996, 2000
o
Gore
loses popular vote shares to Bust due to Perot/Reform effect (Stone & Rapoport, 2001)
|
Decline
in Turnout |
|
||
|
Presidential
Elections 1948-2004 |
|
||
|
mean VEP
1948-1968 |
60.5 |
|
|
|
mean VEP
1972-2004 |
57.4 |
|
|
|
|
3.1 |
|
|
|
Mid-term
Elections 1950-1998 |
|
||
|
mean VEP
1950-70 |
46.0 |
|
|
|
mean VEP
1974-98 |
41.7 |
|
|
|
|
4.3 |
|
|