DEMOCRATS KNEW it was coming, and they braced themselves for the storm. But when the political monsoon finally blew over, the damage appeared unprecedented. No modern presidental candidate has ever received fewer electoral votes than Walter Mondale did last Tuesday. The number--525 to 13--spoke loudly. 1

"All they [The Democrats] have to do now is sort through the rubble," one political analyst says.

And as the President's returns streamed in, the network commentators sounded a Democratic death-knell. NBC's Tom Brokaw confidently reported that Tuesday's impressive results confirmed a realignment of the political parties.

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"In every victory, there are seeds of defeat," Walter Mondale said in his concession speech. "In every defeat, there are seeds of victory," Amidst the grandeur of Ronald Reagan's stunning triumph, these words sounded a hollow clang.

But as objectivity begins to replace the drama of a landslide, the defeated candidate's statement gains greater legitimacy. The Democratic Party is not doomed. In fact, this year's election may actually pave the way for an eventual Democratic resurgence. But with certain costs. For in order to become competitive at the presidential level again, it must reform its role as the party that sets out to cure social ills.

The limits of the President's coattail effect proved that the concept of Republican supremacy in Congress was merely an illusion. Overall, Democrats won 62 percent of the Congressional races, and they picked up two seats in the Senate. Only once before in modern politics when the Republicans lost two seats in 1972--has a party lost ground in the upper chamber while its presidential candidate won the general election.

More significant, however, are the Republican gains in the House of Representatives, a marginal 14 seats. In the 1932 elections--the year of the last "realignment"--Roosevelt and the Democrats gobbled up 97 seats. In 1964, the year in which the liberal agenda gained widespread acceptance in the U.S., Lyndon Johnson led the Democrats with a 37 seat surge. More so than the Senate, the House tends to mirror partisan trends on a national level. And this year, the nation stated that it loves its president but holds no allegiance to his party.

"It's far too early to say that a political realignment has occurred or is about to occur," Professor of History Bradford A. Lee states, "Realignments take place over a period of years."

Indeed, the election of 1932 was not the only Democratic coup during that realignment. From 1930 to 1936, the number of Democrats in the House increased steadily from 163 to 333. Nothing of that nature has occured in the 1980s. Rather, during the last three election cycles the nation has suffered a mild case of political schizophrenia, veering from one partisan orientation to another.

"We're ecstatic," says a political analyst from Peter D. Hart Research Associates, a Washington-based Democratic polling firm. "It could have been much worse. The small coattails indicate that the Republican party is not what the voters went for, but rather, the election was only an endorsement of the President as a leader. Reagan is unbelievably well-liked."

Each election cycle gives more weight to the claim that we are retrospective voters without a cemented ideological basis. In 1974, we punished the Republicans for Watergate and stripped them of more than 40 House seats. In 1980, we rejected President Carter and the Democratic malaise to give the GOP 34 seats. Two years ago, in the midst of the worst recession since pre-World War 11 days, we doled out 26 seats to the President's opposition party. And this year, we rewarded the Republicans with a 14-seat gift for the economic recovery.

What is clear is that the Republicans depend too heavily on Ronald Reagan for their popular support. What will they do without him? Not since 1932 has an outgoing President been succeeded by a member of his own party. Reagan's charm and charisma will not translate into votes for the boring George Bush, Jack Kemp, Howard Baker or Bob Dole. None of these men possesses the spark that Reagan has.

And while the President remains extremely popular, there are no indications that America has, by and large, identified itself with the Administration's policies. Polling data demonstrates that many of those voting for the President do not agree with him ideologically. According to a late summer survey conducted by Market Opinion Research, a Detroit-based polling firm, Democrats still outnumber Republicans, 33 percent to 23 percent, with a full 33 percent of the electorate identified as independent. Eighteen to 24-year-old voters supported the President most enthusiastically, yet polling shows that younger voters remain the most liberal age group. Much of the Republican's current support can be characterized as limp, perhaps easily swayed.

IRONICALLY, the very enormity of the Republicans' victory could prove the most beneficial aspect of the election for the Democrats: the bludgeoning defeat will rid the party of its stifling ideological stagnation. The Democratic Party finally realizes that it must modify its image and policies if it is to recapture the center at the presidential level.