Ever since the emergence of the Democrats and Whigs, the two-party system has dominated American politics. When the Republicans succeeded the Whigs in 1856, the current cast of our political duopoly was set. And as the American political system developed, the two parties were able to cement their dominant positions, often to the point of exclusivity. Winner take all elections, candidate funding schemes, and a tangle of intentional administrative obstacles have served to eliminate most serious threats by upstart organizations. But despite this, there have been several relatively successful third party movements in American history. In light of the recent rise of the modern Tea Party movement, a refresher on some of them could prove insightful.
Third party movements in America have generally come about during times of great social and economic stress. Typically, they have begun as social protest movements, coalesced into political movements, and eventually formed into parties. They have also often met their demise after failed presidential bids, while their issues were diluted and partially co-opted by the major parties.
Three notable examples of this are the American (“Know Nothing”) Party of the 1850s, which arose in reaction to foreign immigration and relentless urbanization; the National Labor Union and accompanying National Labor Reform Party of the 1860s, whose constituency was workers caught in the exploitative grind of the industrial revolution; and the People’s (“Populist”) Party of the 1890s, which emerged as farmers were thrust into the modern market economy. There is a common pattern to the history of all three that today’s Tea Party movement may yet be in the midst of following, at least to some extent.
The Know Nothings- When the mostly Catholic German and Irish immigrants began flooding into the United States during the 1840s, their arrival not only excited nativism and anti-Catholicism, but also contributed to the explosive growth of American cities, reshaping
them beyond recognition and overwhelming their meager abilities to cope. Nativists reacted by organizing local social protest groups that called upon the federal government to restrict immigration and counter supposed anti-American, papal conspiracies. They often organized through self-proclaimed “American” groups, such as the Order of the Star Spangled Banner in New York City. Many of these were based around secret oaths, and thus members came to be called Know Nothings for their tight lipped responses to questions about what actually went on at their secret meetings. Their agenda, however, was no secret.
Know Nothings championed such causes as: clamping down on immigration, especially from Catholic nations; restricting political office to Protestants of English or Scottish descent; and requiring immigrants to wait 21 years before being eligible for U.S. citizenship, which they noted, was how long a native born American had to wait before being able to vote.
Amid social disruptions, the movement politicized and grew, claiming between 
800,000-1,500,000 members by 1854. That year nativist and anti-Catholic forces united to form the American Party, which earned immediate electoral success. Its candidates soon controlled several state governments and nominated former President Millard Fillmore (1850-53) for the White House in 1856. Running with Andrew Jackson’s nephew as his VP, Fillmore finished third, winning only Maryland, though he did pull over 21% of the popular vote nationwide. But his defeat initiated a quick decline for the American Party as its platform was soon eclipsed by the issue of slavery. As the Know Nothing movement began to unravel, It was quickly co-opted by the new Republican Party, which welcomed its members but did little to advance its agenda.
An American Labor Party- Prior to the Civil War, the Know Nothings successfully tapped into voter discontent about issues that politicians had largely ignored while grappling with the looming crises of sectionalism and slavery. Likewise, after the war the National Labor Union developed a strong following by focusing on the growing problems of American workers while the body politic was dominated by issues of reconstruction and race.
By the 1860s, the nature of work in America had changed for many people, and often much for the worse. The United States was originally comprised mostly of independent farmers and craftsmen, but had steadily urbanized and industrialized over the course of the 19th 
century. As a result, more and more people found themselves working in factories, where they spent long hours on jobs that were often mind numbingly repetitious and/or dangerous. In many cases, their rewards were meager wages and virtually no job security. Furthermore, the old guild system inherited from Europe was proving ineffective at representing this new class of unskilled and semi-skilled workers. Guilds, which were local organizations designed protect the interests of master craftsmen, slowly transformed into trade unions for skilled factory workers. However, they offered nothing for the growing masses of factory workers, which often included vulnerable women and children.
Amid these conditions, the National Labor Union formed in Baltimore in 1866 as a confederation of trade unions for skilled workers. Two years later, a founding member and iron puddler in the Philadelphia Iron Molder’s union named William Sylvis became its second president. A stirring leader, Sylvis threw open wide the doors of the NLU’s membership to all American laborers. By welcoming all skilled workers regardless of trade, he hoped the organization could effectively provide cover for the unskilled workers who also joined.
As membership grew, the movement politicized. NLU leaders advocated worker-owned collectives, and lobbied politicians around the nation to eliminate convict labor and institute an eight hour workday. The NLU was also well ahead of its time in promoting equal pay for women, and welcoming African American into its member unions, though prohibiting them from leadership posts. Beyond labor issues, the NLU also favored monetary reform that called for a dismantling of the national banking system and a greatly increased role for the federal government.
Early NLU successes included lobbying Congress to repeal the 1864 contract labor law, which had led the government to recruit foreign laborers during the Civil War, and the implementation of the eight hour day for manual workers employed by the federal government. But there were also setbacks. For example, many federal agencies countered the eight hour restriction by simultaneously reducing wages, despite President Grant’s order not to do so. Likewise, The NLU’s successful efforts to implement the eight hour work day in several states were similarly gutted as the major parties enacted regulations but also left open loopholes that allowed businesses to skirt the new rule.
Sylvis died in 1869, but by then the organization contained 120 affiliated unions, including 14 of national scope, and it boasted a total membership of about half a million. The following year the NLU developed a political wing: the National Labor Reform Party. The party expanded its platform and now also advocated a ban on further immigration of 
Chinese workers to the United States and a reduction of the tariff. But during the 1872 election, the limits of the new National Labor Reform Party’s organizing skills and political acumen soon became evident. At a February convention, it chose Supreme Court Justice David Davis in absentia as its presidential nominee. Davis had no labor record to speak of, but was widely perceived as a true independent, untainted by party politics. His initial response was polite but non-committal. Several months later, he officially declined. Desperate, the NLRP replaced him with Charles O’Connor from New York’s Tammany Hall political machine.
The National Labor Reform Party’s poor political choices exacerbated the existing divide between them and the National Labor Union; many in the NLU preferred to focus on specific, nuts and bolts work issues, and viewed political organizing as impractical. The groups split, the NLRP’s 1872 election campaign collapsed, and the party folded. The next year, the National Labor Union was rocked by a major depression that crippled the economy from 1873-78. Layoffs decimated its membership, and employers used the scarcity of jobs to threaten members: they would be fired from their job if they did not quit the NLU. Times were tough and many people buckled under the pressure. The NLU also collapsed.
The Knights of Labor, the Industrial Workers of the World, and the American Federation of 
Labor succeeded the NLU as national labor unions, but none of them were able to create a labor party, and most of them did not even try, sticking instead to “bread and butter” union issues: wages, working conditions, and job security. Instead, the Democratic Party slowly but surely co-opted labor politics during the early-mid 20th century. It remains today the party of American labor, but it is not, by any stretch, an actual American Labor Party.
The Populists– During the 1870s, American farmers leveraged their debt, mechanized operations, and increased production. Despite these risks, they fell victim to both falling commodity prices and declining social status. They vented their frustration and rage on the 
new big businesses, or “trusts,” that were substantially impacting the American economy for the first time. In particular, farmers’ anger focused on banks and railroads, and it fermented in rural social clubs called Granges. During the 1880s, Granges politicized and coalesced into three major Farmers’ Alliances: one in the North, one in the South, and one for black farmers. With about two million members by the end of the decade, the alliances lobbied for debt relief and increased government regulation of banks and railroads.
In 1892, the Alliances united to form the People’s Party. Though their presidential nominee James Weaver lost despite a surprisingly strong showing, the Populists nonetheless achieved immediate success in the 1892 elections, placing several candidates in governors’ mansions, the House of Representatives, and the U.S. Senate. Even more impressive, Populists won a staggering 1,500 state legislative seats nationwide. As with the Know Nothings and the NLU before them, the People’s Party advocated a strong role for the federal government in reforming society. Their platform called for: a progressive national income tax; government-run alternatives to private banks; the popular election of U.S. senators; government seizure and return to public domain of “excess” corporate land; government ownership of communications and transportation systems; and an inflationary monetary policy known as “free silver.”
A major financial collapse in 1893 further fueled the Populists’ rise as voter discontent grew. But a serious challenge for the presidency in 1896 sputtered when the Democrats stole their thunder by nominating William Jennings Bryan who advocated many Populist proposals. In a desperate move, the People’s Party also nominated Bryan in absentia, but he kept his distance, taking their votes for granted while positioning himself as a loyal Democrat. Their demise quickly followed Bryan’s defeat and the major parties’ continued co-opting and diluting of their platform during the Progressive era (1890-1917).
And that brings us to the Tea Party movement, which thus far is holding true to form in some respects. It too has been born during a period of social and economic tumult. During the 1990s, the United States witnesses levels of immigration it had not seen in nearly a century. More recently, the election of the nation’s first black president challenges many people’s assumptions about America’s social order. And of course the difficult adjustment from an economy based on manufacturing to one based on service and finance has now been compounded by a major recession.
Considering how disruptive these developments are to many people’s sensibilities, it is almost to be expected that many Americans are eagerly responding to a call to arms to restore order. And perhaps we should not be surprised that for many Americans the most attractive answers center around the issues of immigration restriction, monetary and tax policy reform, and a seemingly fundamental unwillingness to accept the president’s legitimacy in the form of the Birther movement.
Given the history cited above, such responses seem almost predictable in light of the current situation. Indeed, in many ways it is eerily similar: a series of social protests emerge during a tumultuous era; those protests become increasingly politicized during the last two years; and those protests have now found a political voice in the spate of Tea Party candidates who won various federal, state, and local offices on November 2nd. But there are always differences of course, and the Tea Party opposition to using government to solve problems is one reflection of how American culture and popular political ideals and culture have shifted since the 19th century.
So what can we expect down the road? It is of course impossible to predict. But if the movement continues to follow in the footsteps of its predecessors (not to mention the Progressive Party of 1912), then we could see the rise of a new political party, followed by a failed presidential bid, and the subsequent co-opting and diluting of Tea Party issues by a major party, in this case the Republicans.
Stay tuned.