Viewpoints – The U.S. Has a Two-Party Problem

Opinion By Adam Garvey

The United States is infamous for its two-party system – a system of electoral politics in which two parties dominate every corner of American politics with little room for any others. This system, set up in the early days of our democracy, has never wavered. Sure, the dominant parties have changed, the wigs and Democratic-Republicans are squarely parties of the past, but it has always been just two. 

This diarchy of power is as fundamental to the United States as the grass being green and the sky being blue. What’s more is that the two alternative parties, the Green and the Libertarians, offer little in the way of viable alternatives. The Green Party, led by Jill Stein for Lord knows how long, only rears its head every four years when there is a presidential election and then disappears seemingly off the face of the Earth. As for the Libertarian Party, congressmen like Justin Amash have made strides to take their party into the mainstream, but the infamous clip of the 2016 Libertarian primary where only a single candidate concedes that he believes it’s important to have a driver’s license,  has since made the party a laughing stock.

It is increasingly clear that the American people have outgrown the Democrat and Republican parties. The only issue is that no one has offered up an alternative or even talked about creating one. Of course, the United States has a myriad of alternative political parties, but they rarely make national inroads and are typically left on the fringes of politics. How many people have even heard of the “Peace and Freedom Party” or the “No Labels Party”  which are respectively  the fourth and fifth largest third party options, both with over 100,000 registered members? 

In New York State, candidates are allowed to run under multiple parties. NY State politicians often take advantage of this fact and run on multiple lines. Democrats often run under the Working Families Party, and Republicans under the Conservative Party. What this does is allow those who wish to break away from the Democrats or Republicans a way to vote third party without feeling like that vote is wasted. Electoral fusion, as it is known, is only available to voters in Connecticut, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Wisconsin, and of course, New York. 

This practice should be in place across the nation and New Yorkers ought to take more advantage of it. For so many people the institutional practices of both the Democrats and the Republicans have become untenable. It increasingly seems like monied interests are more important to both than the will of the American people. Only a complete divestment from these established cohorts will lead us to any fundamental changes. With midterms coming up, the 2026 election cycle is gearing up to be one of the most heated of the 21st century, a period which has seen extremely contentious elections already take place. 

In New York the third party candidate is often the same as the mainstream party candidate for each side of the aisle. There is no downside to taking advantage of this if you feel the same dissatisfaction in the current system that I do. If you vote for a given candidate running under the mainstream party, you can expect more of the same feckless governance we’ve been treated to for the past quarter century. Voting for that candidate under their third party line sends a different message. It tells both the Democratic and Republican institutions that the people are unhappy with them and unwilling to endorse their parties no matter how much they like a given candidate associated with them. Send them that message, because they need to hear it.