Despite the political mayhem to which we can look forward in the coming months, there will be leaders in both parties, members of the press, and many citizens among the public at large who will sense in their hearts that these are clashes on the level of sloganeering, which do not reflect deeply felt rifts in national opinion. Yet of those who sense the far more significant questions which are taking shape offstage, few will be able to articulate them. And those who do will be warned by the experts that these questions are not profitable for election year debate.

These prophecies are neither reckless nor novel. Most of us are aware that the heat generated by our recent national election campaigns arises largely from conflicts only remotely related to the great issues around which the history of the second half of the twentieth century will ultimately be written. We have become accustomed to this state of affairs, and only rarely do we bother to ask ourselves what can be done about it.

We may even remind ourselves that this is not a new thing. In 1928 the possibility of a world-wide depression of catastrophic proportions was not discussed. In 1932, at the depth of the depression, Franklin Roosevelt preached economy and promised a balanced budget as the surest path to economic recovery....

American political life, as I have suggested, can be seen in terms of a few relatively long periods, each dominated by a fairly stable coalition of the interests and factions Madison described--a semipermanent majority with a rough consensus on immediate public questions. Each new coalition finds its instrument in one of the two major political parties. Which one is determined by a complex interaction of traditions and loyalties, leadership and inspiration, strategy and accident. Because that party is identified with a widely accepted view on current issues, it develops a commanding position in the national government.

In the early phases of the cycle, when the new forces which created the new alignment are most dynamic and the public response most clear-cut, the electoral majorities of the dominant party may be overwhelming. Although long voting habits may keep many who share the new majority viewpoint within the fold of the opposition party, in the beginning that party is commonly the haven for those who reject the new consensus. The leaders of this group secure control of the party machinery and position it vigorously against the views widely accepted by the majority of citizens, thus consigning it to the role of semipermanent opposition.

Repeated defeat at the polls, however, leads to an intraparty struggle in an effort to bring the minority party position into closer harmony with what is by now clearly identified as the broad majority view. Meanwhile, as the majority party gains the policy objectives of the consensus it loses its momentum and the two parties grow closer together, each ultimately reflecting, though with important differences of attitude and emphasis, the general position of the underlying consensus among the public at large.

In each of these long periods the minority party has been able of course to interrupt the rule of the majority party for short intervals. Indeed, as the problems raised by new developments began to shoulder aside those earlier ones which gave form and shape to the movement itself, the interruptions tended to become more frequent. As the maturing movement loses its fervor, new personalities may give the minority party temporary advantages; long years in office may lead to a lethargy and lowering of standards in the party which was first to identify itself with the general consensus.

Yet a fundamental change in the direction of our government has always awaited the emergence of urgent and compelling new problems powerful enough to shatter the old majority-minority alignment. Around these new questions has emerged a new consensus, a brilliant new leadership, and a new semipermanent division of the voters into majority and minority groups. This new alignment is substantially altered from the one which preceded it, not only in its ideological reaction to the new challenge but also in its geographic and economic characteristics. The new devision is invariably reflected in a shift in the nature, composition, or role of the two political parties.

Now let us see whether we can really describe our political history in terms of this general pattern.

This history, as I have suggested, may be divided into three periods of the type which I have described. The ideological nature of the consensus that dominated each of these cycles cannot easily be summed up in a paragraph, much less in a phrase. Each was complex, interwoven, and subject to constant changes in emphasis to meet current political pressures.

Yet at the risk of oversimplification it may be said that the first, which extended from Jefferson's victory in 1800 to the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, was characterized by a general acceptance, for the first time in history, of an effective federal government closely responsive to the majority will,

The second, which started in 1861 with Lincoln and ran until Franklin D. Roosevelt's election in 1932, imposed on this primary foundation a dynamic and uniquely American response to the Industrial Revolution, the broadening of civil rights, and the acceptance of corporations as a dominant factor in our economy.

The third, which encompasses the period from 1932 to the present day, reflects a general acceptance of governmental responsibility for minimum standards of living and opportunity and for the full use of our human and capital resources within a system of private ownership.

In the background normally accepted by all but a fringe of extremists, has been a still broader area of agreement on the ground rules under which the political struggle is conducted. These ground rules indicate acceptance of the validity of the democratic process and the denial of the right of the majority unreasonably to impose its will on the minority. On the one occasion when the minority opposing the general consensus in both parties attempted to change these ground rules, the result was civil war....

II