Much of late-nineteenth-century American politics was parade and pageant. Voters crowded the polls, and their votes made a real difference on policy. In Party Games, Mark Wahlgren Summers tells the full story and admires much of the political carnival, but he adds a cautionary note about the dark recesses: vote-buying, election-rigging, blackguarding, news suppression, and violence. Summers also points out that hardball politics and third-party challenges helped make the parties more responsive. Ballyhoo did not replace government action. In order to maintain power, major parties not only rigged the system but also gave dissidents part of what they wanted. The persistence of a two-party system, Summers concludes, resulted from its adaptability, as well as its ruthlessness. Even the reform of political abuses was shaped to fit the needs of the real owners of the political system--the politicians themselves.

This work illuminates the two realities that currently structure the state of American political organisations. This new edition examines changes in the political landscape, including the impact of the Republican electoral triumph of 1994, the Contract with America, third parties and party elites.

This one-volume reference presents the major conceptual approaches to the study of U.S. political parties and the national party system, describing the organization and behavior of U.S. political parties in thematic, narrative chapters that help undergraduate students better understand party origins, historical development, and current operations. Further, it provides researchers with in-depth analysis of important subtopics and connections to other aspects of politics. Key Features: Thematic, narrative chapters, organized into six major parts, provide the context, as well as in-depth analysis of the unique system of party politics in the United States. Top analysts of party politics provide insightful chapters that explore how and why the U.S. parties have changed over time, including major organizational transformations by the parties, behavioral changes among candidates and party activists, and attitudinal changes among their partisans in the electorate. The authors discuss the way the traditional concept of formal party organizations gave way over time to a candidate-centered model, fueled in part by changes in campaign finance, the rise of new communication technologies, and fragmentation of the electorate. This book is an ideal reference for students and researchers who want to develop a deeper understanding of the current challenges faced by citizens of republican government in the United States.