I will talk about these five major political parties: Federalist, Democratic-Republicans, Democrats, Whigs and Republicans. The first party I will talk about is the federalist party. The Federalist Party was founded in 1791 by Alexander Hamilton. The Federalist Party was one of the first political parties in the United States. It did not survive long, it died off soon after the War of 1812 because it was opposed to the democratic spirit of the time.
The Federalist Party did not support the idea of having a strong democracy. The Federalists were more comfortable with the idea of power being in the hands of an Elitist. The Federalists supported the Constitution because it did not allow people to vote directly for the Senate or The President. They felt that this would keep distance between the people and the government. The citizens of America did not believe that they were not capable of ruling themselves so instead they wanted more democracy. This made the Federalists unpopular and helped lead to their demise. Another reason for their demise was that they were in favor of Britain and the way they ruled their people, they supported Britain in their fight against France, that ultimately led to the end of federalist party in 1812.
The next party I will talk about is the Democratic-Republican Party, it was one of America’s first two political parties, founded in 1791 by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. The party was the strongest in the south and more people were in favor of this party than any other parties at the time. The Democratic-Republican Party favored the rights and beliefs of farmers and landowners also state goverments. At the time The Federalists party pushed for the Alien and Sedition Acts, which was unpopular with the democratic-republican party. In response to this act, Thomas Jefferson wrote the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions which urged state legislatures to annul laws that were unconstitutional.
The Democratic-Republican Party occasionally aligned itself politically with France, because the citizens of France followed in the footsteps of the United States and started a revolution of their own. Economically, the Democratic-Republicans wanted the united states to remain an agricultural nation. Jefferson and his successors, Madison and Monroe, served two consecutive terms each. The party later disbanded in the mid-1820’s because new political parties emerged on the scene.
