The History of Third Parties

The United States has always had a two party system, meaning the political scene has always been dominated by two major parties. Since the 1850s, those parties have been the Democrats and the Republicans. A variety of things are responsible for keeping the two party system in place, namely the use of first past the post voting in most elections. However, that hasn’t stopped several third parties from trying to break through.

Timestamps:
0:00 Introduction
0:15 Anti-Masonic Party
1:23 Nullifier Party
2:29 Free Soil Party
3:33 Know Nothings
4:39 Constitutional Union Party
5:43 Liberal Republican Party
6:49 Populist Party
7:56 Socialist Party
8:57 Bull Moose Progressives
9:58 LaFollette Progressives
11:00 Wallace Progressives
12:01 States' Rights Democratic Party
13:03 American Independent Party
14:09 John B. Anderson
15:08 Ross Perot
16:00 Reform Party
16:45 Libertarian Party
17:25 Green Party
18:03 Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
18:45 Conclusion

#politics #history #americanhistory

[oweyy_]

I like how almost all of these third parties have genuine in-depth ideologies with plenty of stances on diverse issues & complex backstories/justifications to why they decided to run as a third party in a two-party system, and then there's just the Dixiecrats who were just like "my party isn't racist enough anymore & since we Dixiecrats are more racist than everyone else in the US and hate rights for black people, we stand alone." That's insane

[therongjr]

You should also have pointed out that Abraham Lincoln's Republican Party was originally a third party. And it was successful!

[destructionfun]

Every time I watch this channel, it gets a little bit higher quality, proud to see you continually honing your craft brother.

[piagebot]

The election of 1912 was crazy. I wanted to make a video about it amidst the current conversation about this upcoming election

[blindboygaming]

Great video my man. Keep the hits coming!

[darkbrightnorth]

If Roosevelt was elected we could have had universal healthcare in the U.S. by now rather than bad healthcare

[caseclosed]

Don’t forget Trump ran for president with the Reform Party back on 2000…

[somefella]

An excellent time to drop it, given RFK has been just absolutely nuts recently.

[pixelorange]

Goes missing for a month, comes back and drops a banger video

[Nikolaj]

I wonder how the US would do with runoff elections. It'd free people up to vote third party if they desired without losing their vote, if their preferred party comes in last. And maybe it would force more people to actually consider policy instead of just engaging with politics on a surface level if they actually had an option to vote more than once.

[Red-Wolf-Ben]

America doesn't need the two-party system. It's the two-party system that needs us.

[StephenParlow]

Excellent video! One recent one you missed (which is understandable since he only got 0.5% of the vote) is Evan Mcmullin in 2016 who was basically a never-Trump-Republican run.

[JarenTilford]

I’m autistic and you uploaded about one of my special interests. Instant like and subscribe

[mathieuleader]

I love how show Smiling friends referenced Ross Perrot's presidential run

[kaanyasin]

I love that you are starting to upload more and more videos

[AggroHusky]

If Teddy could not do it. There is an unlikely chance that anyone will be able to.

[PhailingMath]

I'm glad I subscribed to your channel. You have great, well-made, informative, and entertaining videos. I can't wait for your next one!

[pezpeculiar]

Nice, I'm a member of DSA so cool to see it make an appearance here as a descendant of the Socialist Party

[miniaturejayhawk]

Theodore Roosevelt splitting the republicans is something Donald Trump could have easily replicated if the republicans hadnt nominated him as their candidate. And Ross Perot was basically the Trump before Trump.

[noahlunnen]

I would love if we had like a ten party system. But unfortunately people would just stick with the republicans or democrats instead of looking into the other parties.