Justin Amash is wrong: We don't need to get rid of political parties, we need more of them

Lee Drutman wrote for NBC News about why we need more political parties.

While Amash’s criticisms resonate, his solution rings hollow. He predictably cites George Washington’s valedictory inveighing against the evils of partisanship; but despite the framers’ clever constitutional design, political parties formed almost immediately after the first president left office. Parties, it turned out, were incredibly useful for organizing voting coalitions and building public brands. No modern mass democracy has thrived without parties, and for good reason. Parties are necessary to organize politics.

But for most of American political history, these parties were loose and baggy coalitions without coherent ideological programs. (The obvious exception to this was the 1850s and the 1860s.) This flexible incoherence meant that while America had a two-party system in name, it had something more akin to a multiparty system in practice. For most of the second half of the 20th century, American politics operated more like a four-party system, with liberal Republicans often voting with liberal Democrats, and conservative Democrats often voting with conservative Republicans.

That made governing possible, with support for the president neither anathema nor knee-jerk, and Congress organized in a decentralized, committee-oriented fashion, which is how it has been most effective.