OVER THE past two years, liberal Democrats have often toyed with the idea of a fourth party. Less than two weeks after the 1968 Democratic convention, the idea gained such momenturn that Sen. Eugene McCarthy reportedly met with Gov. Nelson A. Rockfeller to discuss its feasibility.

McCarthy's cool attitude toward politics this fall, however, and Rockefeller's near disappearance from the national scene, have left the liberals with a vacuum of leadership--which men like Allard Lowenstein are now trying to step into.

Along with other founders of the dump-Johnson movement, Lowenstein helped launch the New Democratic Coalition (NDC) following this summer's bloodbath in Chicago. Although a successor to the McCarthy movement, the NDC is seeking a wider, more impressive base of support than McCarthy ever did, and its goal is nothing less than the take-over of the Democratic Party by 1972.

Some of McCarthy's key supporters have thus far refrained from endorsing the NDC startegy. They hope to persuade the Minnesota Senator to remain active in politics, or at least repudiate the NDC, which they consider a Kennedy-dominated organization. But, from all indications, McCarthy is remaining oblivious to their entreades.

At the same time, however, the NDC has been building a broad voalition of white middle class suburbanites, academicians, and students from the old McCarthy movement with progressive Negroes (or less militant blacks, if you will), the Chicano (Mexican-American) community in the Southwest, leftish labour members, and Indians from the late Sen. Robert F. Kennedy's supporters. It is a highly decentralized operation--mostly on a state level, but often on a community level--which in some ways resembles the conservative Republican movement of the carly 1960s.

ALTHOUGH the groups primary goal is to win control of the National Democratic party, most elements of the NDC couple this with afar-reaching program of reform. Some of the leaders and many of the workers in the NDC have actually stated that they would rather not have control of the Party in 1972 if it did not come through instituting a program of reform. The Coalition has four essential reform goals:

(1) Starting extensive social projects which will cause greater involvement and influence of minority groups (including students) in the decision-making process. White members of the NDC in New Jersey hope to help Newark blacks to elect a black in the up-coming mayoralty elections.

(2) Forming the coatition on the concept of shared power. The Texas Coalition held an organizing convention in September which first split up into four caucuses--black, Chicano, student, and white--to draw up demands which they wanted the whole group to deal with. Later, they discussed these at a general meeting and voted on a program.

(3)Starting political action to change both the election laws and the Democratic Party. The Delaware New Democratic Coalition is campaigning for the primary system to choose local and state party candidates, instead of the present convention system, which goes back to the 1820s.

(4) Forming a new concept of the nature of personal commitment to the party--in other words, the right to speak on issues, and the right to with hold endorsement or funds--when that would be greater in achieving goats. This is a direct reaction to the "heavy-handed" Johnson and Humphrey supporters who have continuously claimed that being a Democrat involves a ban on attacks on the Administration or the war in Vietnam.

Arnold Kaufman, a University of Michigan professor who is also on the national executive committee of the NDC, distinguishes the type of liberals who have flooded to this new coalition, especially in labor as humanistic liberals who have flooded to this new coalition, especially in labor, as "humanistic liberals"-contrasted to those like Hubert Humphrey and George Meany, who he calls "custodial liberals." Though many of the "humanist liberals" disagree with Kaufman on the validity of using that particular term. most will admit that there is a wide divergence on both ideology and specific solutions-to the problems, for example, of the ghetto or the war in Vietnam-between the two groups.

This new coalition is still extremely fluid; the differences between the old and new shade of liberalism especially without the unifying pressure of a Presidential primary campaign, appear at some points almost as wide as between the moderate black demands and the suburban whites. But at state conferences, as in Connecticut last weekend, and at national conferences in Minneapolis and St. Louis earlier this fall, the specifics of priorities and programs began to emerge.

Kennedy's assassination brought many Mexican-Americans and Indians into the new group. There is some question, however, if the moderate black leadership-which has been noticeably hesitant about joining the coalition-will participate in the future. In Pennsylvania, for instance, the race gap appears too large to bridge.

Though mistakes hard to reverse later have been made in the coalition, the new alliance of liberals appears to have a much better chance of success in December of 1968 than it did at any time during the pre-convention Presidential battle. The political landscape was changed quite radically by campaigns (Kennedy, McCarthy, and McGovern) within the party and by the Democrats' defeat in the November elections. In Arizona, for instance, the Democrats hold no statewide offices (from U.S. Senator down) and are in a minority in both houses of the legislature. "In 1968 the conservatives kept telling us not to upset the applecart--Johnson would lose and we would be defeated on the state level," said Richard Wilks, a Pheonix lawyer who heads the Arizona NDC. "Well, after November, there's just no applecart left." The conservatives are weak in Arizona and are searching for attractive candidates for lower offices, which the new liberals can have almost for the asking if they appear to be winners.

In New Jersey, long famous for its country machines, the situation is much the same. In 1967 the Democrats suffered massive defeats in the legislative elections (leaving the formerly Democratic House with a 3-1 Republican edge). Coupled with Nixon's strong showing, this has made the country bosses weak and open to any Democrat who looks like he can win in the 1969 state elections. The New Jersey NDC, while spending much of 1963 fighting the bosses, will use the country bosses' support in 1969 before trying to oust them in later party fights.

Only in a few Eastern states like Rhode Island and Massachusetts did Humphrey victories bring even larger Democratic majorities in the state legislatures.

The anti-Administration movement suffered in 1968 because it had few leaders who were either recognized by the press or who had much political experience. Both of these deficiencies have been met to a limited extent. Names like Allard Lowenstein, Julian Bond, John Gilligan, and Don Peterson are now both well-known and respected in the Washington press corps.

Lowenstein's plan to try to dump President Johnson was received as the mad plan of a New York professor-lawyer during the fall of 1967; he is now a Congressman from Long Island whom most "humanist liberals" and experienced political observers like David Halberstam regard as a responsible national leader.

In retrospect, the McCarthy campaign's greatest success might have been to give many liberals the political experience necessary to fight successful later battles. These are no longer the innocent amateurs who tried to take control of the state delegations to the national convention, screaming foul when they were defeated.

The McCarthyites have stayed in politics, instead of leaving, as most regular Democartic Party officials claimed they would. Like any segment of a political party, in an off-year their numbers aren't as great as during a Presidential camapign. But with a corps of a new thousand active supporters in each state who come from a wide base, many New Democratic Coalition organizations are waging the most vigorous fight in history to take over their state parties.

In Rhode Island the NDC called a meeting earlier this fall to which it invited about 200 of the most active Kennedy and McCarthy supporters. More than 1000 people showed up. Similar scenes have been repeated in Arizona and Washington. Many of these people are going to work at the precinct level to win control of party organizations.

The campaigns have already brought substantial gains. In Kentucky, for instance, the liberal coalition now controls about one-fourth of the Louisville party organization. The party in Minneapolis and St. Paul was taken over by student activists and suburbanites in the McCarthy drive--they have not let go, despite Hubert Humphrey's recent pledge to oust the "kooks" from the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party.

In Washington four philosophy professors from West Washington State College were elected to the Democratic City Committee in Bellingham late last month.

In several states, including New Hampshire, Michigan, Iowa, and California, the "humanist" liberals already control either a substantial minority (more than 40 per cent) or a majority of the state Democratic parites. This power is partially a result of the McCarthy movement.

Nonetheless, serious problems remain:

* It is extremely difficult to keep such a diverse coalition together without an ogre-in-residence. On the national level Hubert Humphrey's recent stirrings about the 1972 Presidential race together with Richard Nixon's Presidency might be able to fill the bill of the "clear and present danger" which the alliance needs in the near future if differences are to be buried.

* Power may be hard to get, but for liberals (witness New York City's reform movement, for example) it is often harder to keep. And once in power the coalition is obligated to the policies of all members of the alliance. It is very easy for "outs" to unite compared with serving the interests of the many deprived groups which this coalition represents. A white middle class suburbanite state administrator might quickly drive even black moderates into the opposition. This problem will be faced by Rhode Island with Governor Licht in the immediate future and probably by many states following the 1970 elections, if the "humanists" are successful.

* Though the NDC espouses the philosophy of participatory politics, it is hardly operating at the present time on the widespread base that it claims. All organizations tend to become elitist once leaders arise, as they did in 1968 in the left-liberal community. It is almost inevitable that these leaders who work continuously on day-to-day implementation of the programs will impose, either inadverently or not, their own views of future policy. Thus participatory politics can easily become a euphemism for the old decision-making process.

Already some of the leaders of the "New Politics" like Gerry Hill, chairman of the California Democratic Council (CDC--the NDC chapter in California), has adopted much of the rheteric and style of the politicians whom he seeks to replace.

* Liberals--like their radical and rightist counterparts--also have a tendency to factionalize along ideological lines. It is hard to avoid.

The "humanist" liberals, of course, have many things going in their favor which the McCarthy movement didn't have this year. The key factor is time and commitment born in the anger of the past year's outrages by the regular Democrats. If they can set up an effective national organization, which they appear to be doing, then the money and political expertise which the different state organizations need can be readily provided. With intelligent leaders like Lowenstein, Bond, Michtel Harrington, Adam Walensky, and the Rev. Channing Phillips, the NDC appears to have a wealth of talent unequaled in past American political insurgencies.

What these left liberal Democrats are trying to do, in essence, is to redefine the Democratic "liberal": his policies, programs and comrades-in-arms This political realignment is taking place in the context of a movement for political power. As 1968 proved, it can be a brutal battle.

The regular party organization appears relatively dormant now, but the New Democratic Coalition has 44 months in which to do the work necessary to put the regulars where, as one NDC organizer feels, they should lie forever--"in the doghouse of history.