Republicans become the third party to a Conservative Party

What would it take for a Conservative Party to emerge in US politics as the main right-wing alternative to the Democrats and for the Republicans to end up as a minor centrist party somewhat akin to the Liberal Party of the UK?
 
You'd need electoral fusion to be legal in all states rather than just a few, and this would probably mean a Supreme Court case.
 

Thomas1195

Banned
But, they must be successful in their very first national attempt. Otherwise, they would be a perennal third party.
 

Wallet

Banned
The moment a splinter extreme party comes out preventing electoral victory for one of the two parties, the party leaders change the platform to unite the movement.

It's happen before for both Democrats and Republicans. The Republican Party would just change its platform to please the splinter party in the next election.

There's lots of reasons we have a two party system. Both parties cater to the extreme fringes to remain big tent parties. The electoral college requires a straight majority of electors to win. Multiple parties (3+) would prevent a party from winning a majority.
 
Historically, you'd need a couple of things: you'd need a reason for various political factions not to reconcile with each other, and you'd need a certain amount of systemic reform to emerge from that inability to reconcile.

The most obvious point of discussion in the 20th century is the concentration of the conservative coalition on one side of the aisle, where before its constituent parts were either split between the two parties or non-existent as a political force. To get the party structure you want, you'd have to stop that concentration; convince conservatives their future didn't lie with Democrats OR Republicans.

One suggestion that I've seen frequently deployed on the board is to have both parties embrace civil rights basically as early as you can, and continue their push to the relative left on social policy that was happening from the 1940s to the 1970s. The Democratic brand continues to build around labor, the Republican brand continues to build around the less definitive concept of good governance (which sets them up for third-party status later on; doesn't sell as well as rights for the working man). Conservatives are shut out from both parties more forcefully and consistently to the point where they feel they have nothing left to lose by jumping ship.

The problem here is that IOTL political opportunism always kept the parties talking to their conservative elements during this period. You need to make conservative concerns anathema to national victory. A savvier left-wing campaign for the welfare state coupled by harsher conservative backlash against civil rights might do it.

We had plenty of third-party candidates IOTL built around conservative ideologies, but none that ticked off all the conservative boxes. If you could manage it here, it might show the flaws in the American system when more than two sides are involved. One can imagine lots of scenarios where compromises are enacted for political expediency. For example, a hung electoral college where Conservatives agree to support the Republican in exchange for support for a Constitutional amendment that makes a three-party system viable.

If you don't get that systemic change, though, the entire thing won't last. The Republicans would be more likely to just disappear than remain a minor party under our current system. Or more likely, they'd be like the DFL Party in Minnesota; just a pretty meaningless historical appendage to the Democratic Party.
 
Hm... what if the Republicans give in to their progressive wing in the teens and twenties?

Have Roosevelt win the 1912 nomination and win the Presidency, and push hard for the GOP to become progressive. Have LaFollette continue doing this throughout the 20s, so that the GOP becomes the more liberal of the two parties. Then, have everything proceed at OTL until the 60s. Once the Democrats swing in favor of civil rights, along with the progressive GOP (unlikely, admittedly, in this scenario), have the Dixiecrats stay around, and gradually "moderate" (drop segregation, basically), and then come roaring back in the 80s. The GOP becomes a New England regionalist party, occasionally winning plains states if they get lucky. They generally caucus with the Democrats in the House and Senate. The strong support in the north keeps them from being completely wiped out as a party.

Admittedly, this scenario is probably a stretch, but that's how I think it could happen.
 
But, they must be successful in their very first national attempt. Otherwise, they would be a perennal third party.

More specifically their first Congressional attempt. A Presidential candidacy w/o Congressional "coat tails" will be a nine days wonder.
 
Long term this is highly unlikely in any first past the post or other plurality voting system, a phenomenon known as Duverger's law.
 
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