Do you agree with George Washington who said that Political Parties will only serve to divide us ?
If one reads that section of Washington’s Farewell Address to which you refer (http://www.laughtergenealogy.com/bin/history/politics.html), his words seem prescient. However, I think what political parties do is to classify divisions that already exist. If we look at Washington’s Presidency, fierce “partisan” division existed almost from the very beginning, especially as Hamilton put together the nation’s economic foundation. After all, Hamilton and Jefferson had their philosophies and followers before the labels “Federalist” and “Democratic-Republican” existed. The parties coalesced around those two individuals. Jefferson’s efforts to derail Hamilton, and Hamilton’s counterattacks against Jefferson, were extremely upsetting to Washington. He seems to have had the impression that after the life-and-death struggle of the Revolution, that we would all come together in one big, happy, utopian community
It seems the divide between conservative and progressives has not been larger since I became aware of politics in the 60s. Certain highly emotional issues tend to divide Americans while overshadowing many of the issues that might influence our quality of life much more. Because our two major parties have aligned themselves with these emotional issues, people have difficulty making an objective evaluation of the candidates overall platform. The concept of having a national organization that can help major candidates earn delegates made some sense when the process was created. Travel and communication where not very well developed when the rules were first written. Now, we hardly need such a complicated, convoluted system to nominate a candidate or elect a president. It sometimes appears that folks in power don’t want to simplify the process because it would diminish their influence on the outcome. The two major parties in this country enjoy a monopoly on media coverage that translates t
It is only natural. While parties will divide the country, there is something wrong when one of them thinks that the US is the source of all evil in the world. This is an exaggeration for most of them, but there are those few. While two parties do not have to agree on everything, they do not have to disagree on everything. The fact that the US is a great nation shouldn’t be in question. I’m not saying a perfect nation, but a great nation & getting better.
