The Democratic Party is a
center-left
Centre-left politics is the range of left-wing political ideologies that lean closer to the political centre. Ideologies commonly associated with it include social democracy, social liberalism, progressivism, and green politics. Ideas commonl ...
political party in the United States. One of the
major parties
A major party is a political party that holds substantial influence in a country's politics, standing in contrast to a minor party.
According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary:
Major parties hold a significant percentage of the vote in election ...
of the U.S., it was founded in 1828, making it the world's oldest active political party. Its main rival since the 1850s has been the
Republican Party, and the two have since dominated
American politics
In the United States, politics functions within a framework of a constitutional federal republic, federal democratic republic with a presidential system. The three distinct branches Separation of powers, share powers: United States Congress, C ...
.
The Democratic Party was founded in 1828 from remnants of the
Democratic-Republican Party
The Democratic-Republican Party (also referred to by historians as the Republican Party or the Jeffersonian Republican Party), was an American political party founded by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison in the early 1790s. It championed li ...
. Senator
Martin Van Buren
Martin Van Buren ( ; ; December 5, 1782 – July 24, 1862) was the eighth president of the United States, serving from 1837 to 1841. A primary founder of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as Attorney General o ...
played the central role in building the coalition of state organizations which formed the new party as a vehicle to help elect
Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before Presidency of Andrew Jackson, his presidency, he rose to fame as a general in the U.S. Army and served in both houses ...
as president that year. It initially supported
Jacksonian democracy
Jacksonian democracy, also known as Jacksonianism, was a 19th-century political ideology in the United States that restructured a number of federal institutions. Originating with the seventh U.S. president, Andrew Jackson and his supporters, i ...
,
agrarianism
Agrarianism is a social philosophy, social and political philosophy that advocates for rural development, a Rural area, rural agricultural lifestyle, family farming, widespread property ownership, and political decentralization. Those who adhere ...
, and
geographical expansionism, while opposing
a national bank and high
tariffs
A tariff or import tax is a duty imposed by a national government, customs territory, or supranational union on imports of goods and is paid by the importer. Exceptionally, an export tax may be levied on exports of goods or raw materials and is ...
. Democrats won six of the eight presidential elections from 1828 to 1856, losing twice to the
Whigs. In 1860, the party split into
Northern and
Southern factions over
slavery
Slavery is the ownership of a person as property, especially in regards to their labour. Slavery typically involves compulsory work, with the slave's location of work and residence dictated by the party that holds them in bondage. Enslavemen ...
. The party remained dominated by agrarian interests, contrasting with Republican support for the
big business
Big business involves large-scale corporate-controlled financial or business activities. As a term, it describes activities that run from "huge transactions" to the more general "doing big things". In corporate jargon, the concept is commonly ...
of the
Gilded Age
In History of the United States, United States history, the Gilded Age is the period from about the late 1870s to the late 1890s, which occurred between the Reconstruction era and the Progressive Era. It was named by 1920s historians after Mar ...
. Democratic candidates won the presidency only twice between 1860 and 1908, though they
won the popular vote two more times in that period. During the
Progressive Era
The Progressive Era (1890s–1920s) was a period in the United States characterized by multiple social and political reform efforts. Reformers during this era, known as progressivism in the United States, Progressives, sought to address iss ...
, some factions of the party supported
progressive reforms, with
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was the 28th president of the United States, serving from 1913 to 1921. He was the only History of the Democratic Party (United States), Democrat to serve as president during the Prog ...
being elected president in 1912 and 1916.
In 1932,
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), also known as FDR, was the 32nd president of the United States, serving from 1933 until his death in 1945. He is the longest-serving U.S. president, and the only one to have served ...
was elected president after campaigning on a strong response to the
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...
. His
New Deal
The New Deal was a series of wide-reaching economic, social, and political reforms enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1938, in response to the Great Depression in the United States, Great Depressi ...
programs created
a broad Democratic coalition which united White southerners, Northern workers,
labor unions
A trade union (British English) or labor union (American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages ...
,
African Americans
African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa ...
,
Catholic
The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
and
Jewish communities
Jewish ethnic divisions refer to many distinctive communities within the world's Jewish population. Although "Jewish" is considered an ethnicity itself, there are distinct ethnic subdivisions among Jews, most of which are primarily the result o ...
, progressives, and
liberals. From the late 1930s,
a conservative minority in the party's Southern wing joined with Republicans to slow and stop further progressive domestic reforms. After the
civil rights movement and
Great Society
The Great Society was a series of domestic programs enacted by President Lyndon B. Johnson in the United States between 1964 and 1968, aimed at eliminating poverty, reducing racial injustice, and expanding social welfare in the country. Johnso ...
era of progressive legislation under
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), also known as LBJ, was the 36th president of the United States, serving from 1963 to 1969. He became president after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, under whom he had served a ...
, who was often able to overcome the conservative coalition in the 1960s, many White southerners
switched to the Republican Party as the Northeastern states became more reliably Democratic.
The party's labor union element has weakened since the 1970s amid
deindustrialization
Deindustrialization is a process of social and economic change caused by the removal or reduction of industrial capacity or activity in a country or region, especially of heavy industry or manufacturing industry.
There are different interpr ...
, and during the 1980s it lost many White working-class voters to the Republicans under
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan (February 6, 1911 – June 5, 2004) was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He was a member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party a ...
. The election of
Bill Clinton
William Jefferson Clinton (né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician and lawyer who was the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, ...
in 1992 marked a shift for the party toward
centrism
Centrism is the range of political ideologies that exist between left-wing politics and right-wing politics on the left–right political spectrum. It is associated with moderate politics, including people who strongly support moderate policie ...
and the
Third Way
The Third Way is a predominantly centrist political position that attempts to reconcile centre-right and centre-left politics by advocating a varying synthesis of Right-wing economics, right-wing economic and Left-wing politics, left-wing so ...
, shifting its economic stance toward
market-based policies.
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...
oversaw the party's passage of the
Affordable Care Act
The Affordable Care Act (ACA), formally known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) and informally as Obamacare, is a landmark U.S. federal statute enacted by the 111th United States Congress and signed into law by Presid ...
in 2010.
In the 21st century, the Democratic Party's strongest demographics are
urban voters,
college graduates (especially those with
graduate degrees),
African Americans
African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa ...
, women, younger voters, irreligious voters, the unmarried and
LGBTQ people
LGBTQ people are individuals who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or questioning. Many variants of the initialism are used; LGBTQIA+ people incorporates intersex, asexual, aromantic, agender, and other individuals. The group i ...
. On social issues, it advocates for
abortion rights
Abortion-rights movements, also self-styled as pro-choice movements, are movements that advocate for legal access to induced abortion services, including elective abortion. They seek to represent and support women who wish to terminate their p ...
,
LGBTQ rights
Rights affecting lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) people vary greatly by country or jurisdiction—encompassing everything from the legal recognition of same-sex marriage to the death penalty for homosexuality.
Nota ...
,
action on
climate change
Present-day climate change includes both global warming—the ongoing increase in Global surface temperature, global average temperature—and its wider effects on Earth's climate system. Climate variability and change, Climate change in ...
, and the
legalization of marijuana
The legality of cannabis for medical and recreational use varies by country, in terms of its possession, distribution, and cultivation, and (in regards to medical) how it can be consumed and what medical conditions it can be used for. The ...
. On economic issues, the party favors
healthcare reform
Health care reform is for the most part governmental policy that affects health care delivery in a given place. Health care reform typically attempts to:
* Broaden the population that receives health care coverage through either public sector insu ...
,
paid sick leave
Sick leave (or paid sick days or sick pay) is paid time off from work that workers can use to stay home to address their health needs without losing pay. It differs from paid vacation time or time off work to deal with personal matters, because ...
,
paid family leave
Parental leave, or family leave, is an employee benefit available in almost all countries. The term "parental leave" may include maternity, paternity, and adoption leave; or may be used distinctively from "maternity leave" and "paternity leave ...
and
supporting unions.
In foreign policy, the party supports
liberal internationalism
Liberal internationalism is a foreign policy doctrine that supports international institutions, open markets, cooperative security, and liberal democracy. At its core, it holds that states should participate in international institutions that up ...
as well as tough stances against
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...
and
Russia
Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...
.
History

Democratic Party officials often trace its origins to the
Democratic-Republican Party
The Democratic-Republican Party (also referred to by historians as the Republican Party or the Jeffersonian Republican Party), was an American political party founded by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison in the early 1790s. It championed li ...
, founded by
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (, 1743July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was the primary author of the United States Declaration of Indepe ...
,
James Madison
James Madison (June 28, 1836) was an American statesman, diplomat, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the fourth president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. Madison was popularly acclaimed as the ...
and other influential opponents of the conservative
Federalists in 1792.
[The party has claimed a founding date of 1792 as noted in S.2047 which passed in the United States Senate in 1991. " 1992, the Democratic Party of the United States will celebrate the 200th anniversary of its establishment on May 13, 1792."] That party died out before the modern Democratic Party was organized; the Jeffersonian party also inspired the
Whigs and modern Republicans. Historians argue that the modern Democratic Party was first organized in the late 1820s with the election of war hero
Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before Presidency of Andrew Jackson, his presidency, he rose to fame as a general in the U.S. Army and served in both houses ...
[Michael Kazin, ''What It Took to Win: A History of the Democratic Party'' (2022) pp 5, 12.] of Tennessee, making it the world's oldest active political party.
[M. Philip Lucas, "Martin Van Buren as Party Leader and at Andrew Jackson's Right Hand." in ''A Companion to the Antebellum Presidents 1837–1861'' (2014): 107–129.]["The Democratic Party, founded in 1828, is the world's oldest political party" states ] It was predominately built by
Martin Van Buren
Martin Van Buren ( ; ; December 5, 1782 – July 24, 1862) was the eighth president of the United States, serving from 1837 to 1841. A primary founder of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as Attorney General o ...
, who assembled a wide cadre of politicians in every state behind Jackson.
Since the nomination of
William Jennings Bryan
William Jennings Bryan (March 19, 1860 – July 26, 1925) was an American lawyer, orator, and politician. He was a dominant force in the History of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, running three times as the party' ...
in 1896, the party has generally positioned itself to the left of the
Republican Party on economic issues. Democrats have been more liberal on civil rights since 1948, although conservative factions within the Democratic Party that opposed them persisted in the South until the 1960s. On foreign policy, both parties have changed positions several times.
Background

The Democratic Party evolved from the
Jeffersonian Republican or
Democratic-Republican Party
The Democratic-Republican Party (also referred to by historians as the Republican Party or the Jeffersonian Republican Party), was an American political party founded by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison in the early 1790s. It championed li ...
organized by Jefferson and Madison in opposition to the Federalist Party. The Democratic-Republican Party favored
republicanism
Republicanism is a political ideology that encompasses a range of ideas from civic virtue, political participation, harms of corruption, positives of mixed constitution, rule of law, and others. Historically, it emphasizes the idea of self ...
, a weak
federal government
A federation (also called a federal state) is an entity characterized by a political union, union of partially federated state, self-governing provinces, states, or other regions under a #Federal governments, federal government (federalism) ...
,
states' rights
In United States, American politics of the United States, political discourse, states' rights are political powers held for the state governments of the United States, state governments rather than the federal government of the United States, ...
, agrarian interests (especially Southern planters), and strict adherence to the Constitution. The party opposed a national bank and
Great Britain
Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-west coast of continental Europe, consisting of the countries England, Scotland, and Wales. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the List of European ...
. After the
War of 1812
The War of 1812 was fought by the United States and its allies against the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom and its allies in North America. It began when the United States United States declaration of war on the Uni ...
, the Federalists virtually disappeared and the only national political party left was the Democratic-Republicans, which was prone to splinter along regional lines. The era of one-party rule in the United States, known as the
Era of Good Feelings
The Era of Good Feelings marked a period in the political history of the United States that reflected a sense of national purpose and a desire for unity among Americans in the aftermath of the War of 1812. The era saw the collapse of the Fe ...
, lasted from 1816 until 1828, when Andrew Jackson became president. Jackson and Martin Van Buren worked with allies in each state to form a new Democratic Party on a national basis. In the 1830s, the
Whig Party coalesced into the main rival to the Democrats.
When exactly the Democratic party formed is still debated among Historians, with many putting forth the 1828 date of the creation of a federal structure for the various Jacksonian movements as the foundation date, however, it could also be argued that the foundation of these Jacksonian groups could be the foundation date. In that case the Democratic Party would be formed on December 23, 1823 when the Greensburg Committee read the ''Greensburg Resolution'' outside the
Westmoreland County courthouse in
Greensburg,
Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania, officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a U.S. state, state spanning the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern United States, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes region, Great Lakes regions o ...
. The committee consisted of five of Greensburg's most prominent political figures, the brothers
Jacob M. Wise
Jacob M. Wise was an American politician from Pennsylvania who served in the Pennsylvania State Senate, representing the 18th district from 1811 to 1818. During his tenure the 18th district represented Westmoreland County in Western Pennsylvani ...
(state senator),
John H. Wise (state representative and brigadier general), and Frederick A. Wise (owner and editor of the ''
Westmoreland Republican
The ''Westmoreland Republican'' was a newspaper published in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, Greensburg, Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania from 1799 to 1865.
History ''The Register''
The newspaper started life in 1799 ...
''), alongside
David Marchand
David Marchand was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Pennsylvania. He was born near Irwin, Pennsylvania. He studied medicine and practiced in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania. He was a major general of the Thirteenth Divisio ...
(state representative), and
James Clarke (state representative). The ''Greensburg Resolution'' was the first published call for Jackson to run for President the 'origin' of the Jackson movement that turned into the Democratic party.
The event that transformed the Jacksonians from just another faction of the Democratic-Republican party into a divergent political force would be the so-called "
corrupt bargain
In American political jargon, corrupt bargain is a backdoor deal for or involving the U.S. presidency. Three events in particular in American political history have been called the corrupt bargain: the 1824 United States presidential election, ...
" of 1824, where, despite winning the most popular and electoral votes, the House of Representatives did not confirm Jackson as the newly elected president, instead
Henry Clay
Henry Clay (April 12, 1777June 29, 1852) was an American lawyer and statesman who represented Kentucky in both the United States Senate, U.S. Senate and United States House of Representatives, House of Representatives. He was the seventh Spea ...
, who was both a candidate and the speaker of the house,
whipped his supporters in congress to vote for the runner-up,
John Quincy Adams
John Quincy Adams (; July 11, 1767 – February 23, 1848) was the sixth president of the United States, serving from 1825 to 1829. He previously served as the eighth United States secretary of state from 1817 to 1825. During his long diploma ...
, in exchange for Adams naming Clay the Secretary of State. Jackson and his followers began to more seriously coalesce into a structured party for the next election in 1828.
Before 1860, the Democratic Party supported
expansive presidential power,
the interests of
slave states
In the United States before 1865, a slave state was a state in which slavery and the internal or domestic slave trade were legal, while a free state was one in which they were prohibited. Between 1812 and 1850, it was considered by the slave s ...
,
agrarianism
Agrarianism is a social philosophy, social and political philosophy that advocates for rural development, a Rural area, rural agricultural lifestyle, family farming, widespread property ownership, and political decentralization. Those who adhere ...
,
and
expansionism
Expansionism refers to states obtaining greater territory through military Imperialism, empire-building or colonialism.
In the classical age of conquest moral justification for territorial expansion at the direct expense of another established p ...
,
while opposing
a national bank and high
tariff
A tariff or import tax is a duty (tax), duty imposed by a national Government, government, customs territory, or supranational union on imports of goods and is paid by the importer. Exceptionally, an export tax may be levied on exports of goods ...
s.
19th century
Jacksonian Era

The
Democratic-Republican Party
The Democratic-Republican Party (also referred to by historians as the Republican Party or the Jeffersonian Republican Party), was an American political party founded by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison in the early 1790s. It championed li ...
split over the choice of a successor to President
James Monroe
James Monroe ( ; April 28, 1758July 4, 1831) was an American Founding Father of the United States, Founding Father who served as the fifth president of the United States from 1817 to 1825. He was the last Founding Father to serve as presiden ...
. The faction that supported many of the old
Jeffersonian principles, led by Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren, became the modern Democratic Party. Historian
Mary Beth Norton
Mary Beth Norton (born 1943) is an American historian, specializing in American colonial history and well known for her work on women's history and the Salem witch trials. She is the Mary Donlon Alger Professor Emeritus of American History at th ...
explains the transformation in 1828:

Behind the platforms issued by state and national parties stood a widely shared political outlook that characterized the Democrats:
Opposing factions led by
Henry Clay
Henry Clay (April 12, 1777June 29, 1852) was an American lawyer and statesman who represented Kentucky in both the United States Senate, U.S. Senate and United States House of Representatives, House of Representatives. He was the seventh Spea ...
helped form the Whig Party. The Democratic Party had a small yet decisive advantage over the Whigs until the 1850s when the Whigs fell apart over the issue of slavery. In 1854, angry with the
Kansas–Nebraska Act
The Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854 () was a territorial organic act that created the territories of Kansas and Nebraska. It was drafted by Democratic Senator Stephen A. Douglas, passed by the 33rd United States Congress, and signed into law b ...
, anti-slavery Democrats left the party and joined Northern Whigs to form the
Republican Party. Martin van Buren also helped found the
Free Soil Party
The Free Soil Party, also called the Free Democratic Party or the Free Democracy, was a political party in the United States from 1848 to 1854, when it merged into the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party. The party was focused o ...
to oppose the spread of slavery, running as its candidate in the
1848 presidential election, before returning to the Democratic Party and staying loyal to the Union.
U.S. Civil War

The Democrats split over slavery, with Northern and Southern tickets in the
election of 1860, in which the Republican Party gained ascendancy. The radical pro-slavery
Fire-Eaters
In American history, the Fire-Eaters were a loosely aligned group of radical pro-secession Democrats in the antebellum South who urged the separation of the slave states into a new nation, in which chattel slavery and a distinctive "Southern ci ...
led walkouts at the two conventions when the delegates would not adopt a resolution supporting the extension of slavery into territories even if the voters of those territories did not want it. These
Southern Democrats
Southern Democrats are members of the U.S. Democratic Party who reside in the Southern United States.
Before the American Civil War, Southern Democrats mostly believed in Jacksonian democracy. In the 19th century, they defended slavery in the ...
nominated the pro-slavery incumbent vice president,
John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky, for president and General
Joseph Lane
Joseph Lane (December 14, 1801 – April 19, 1881) was an American politician and soldier. He was a state legislator representing Evansville, Indiana, and then served in the Mexican–American War, becoming a general. President James K. Polk ap ...
, of Oregon, for vice president. The
Northern Democrats
The Northern Democratic Party was a leg of the Democratic Party during the 1860 presidential election, when the party split in two factions because of disagreements over slavery. They held two conventions before the election, in Charleston and ...
nominated Senator
Stephen A. Douglas
Stephen Arnold Douglas (né Douglass; April 23, 1813 – June 3, 1861) was an American politician and lawyer from Illinois. As a United States Senate, U.S. senator, he was one of two nominees of the badly split Democratic Party (United States) ...
of Illinois for president and former Georgia Governor
Herschel V. Johnson
Herschel Vespasian Johnson (September 18, 1812August 16, 1880) was an American politician. He was the List of governors of Georgia, 41st Governor of Georgia from 1853 to 1857 and the vice presidential nominee of the Stephen A. Douglas, Douglas w ...
for vice president. This fracturing of the Democrats led to a Republican victory and
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the 16th president of the United States, serving from 1861 until Assassination of Abraham Lincoln, his assassination in 1865. He led the United States through the American Civil War ...
was elected the 16th president of the United States.
As the
American Civil War
The American Civil War (April 12, 1861May 26, 1865; also known by Names of the American Civil War, other names) was a civil war in the United States between the Union (American Civil War), Union ("the North") and the Confederate States of A ...
broke out, Northern Democrats were divided into
War Democrats
War Democrats in American politics of the 1860s were members of the Democratic Party who supported the Union and rejected the policies of the Copperheads, or Peace Democrats. The War Democrats demanded a more aggressive policy toward the Co ...
and
Peace Democrats
In the 1860s, the Copperheads, also known as Peace Democrats, were a faction of the Democratic Party in the Union who opposed the American Civil War and wanted an immediate peace settlement with the Confederates.
Republicans started labelin ...
. The
Confederate States of America
The Confederate States of America (CSA), also known as the Confederate States (C.S.), the Confederacy, or Dixieland, was an List of historical unrecognized states and dependencies, unrecognized breakaway republic in the Southern United State ...
deliberately avoided organized political parties. Most War Democrats rallied to Republican President Abraham Lincoln and the Republicans'
National Union Party in the
election of 1864, which featured
Andrew Johnson
Andrew Johnson (December 29, 1808July 31, 1875) was the 17th president of the United States, serving from 1865 to 1869. The 16th vice president, he assumed the presidency following the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Johnson was a South ...
on the Union ticket to attract fellow Democrats. Johnson replaced Lincoln in 1865, but he stayed independent of both parties.
Reconstruction and Redemption
The Democrats benefited from white Southerners' resentment of
Reconstruction
Reconstruction may refer to:
Politics, history, and sociology
*Reconstruction (law), the transfer of a company's (or several companies') business to a new company
*''Perestroika'' (Russian for "reconstruction"), a late 20th century Soviet Union ...
after the war and consequent hostility to the Republican Party. After
Redeemers
The Redeemers were a political coalition in the Southern United States during the Reconstruction era of the United States, Reconstruction Era that followed the American Civil War. Redeemers were the Southern wing of the Democratic Party (Unite ...
ended Reconstruction in the 1870s and following the often extremely violent
disenfranchisement
Disfranchisement, also disenfranchisement (which has become more common since 1982) or voter disqualification, is the restriction of suffrage (the right to vote) of a person or group of people, or a practice that has the effect of preventing someo ...
of African Americans led by such
white supremacist
White supremacy is the belief that white people are superior to those of other races. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of any power and privilege held by white people. White supremacy has roots in the now-discredited doctrine ...
Democratic politicians as
Benjamin Tillman
Benjamin Ryan Tillman (August 11, 1847 – July 3, 1918) was a politician of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party who served as List of governors of South Carolina, governor of South Carolina from 1890 to 1894, and as a Un ...
of
South Carolina
South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...
in the 1880s and 1890s, the South, voting Democratic, became known as the "
Solid South
The Solid South was the electoral voting bloc for the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party in the Southern United States between the end of the Reconstruction era in 1877 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In the aftermath of the Co ...
". Although Republicans won all but two presidential elections, the Democrats remained competitive. The party was dominated by pro-business
Bourbon Democrat
Bourbon Democrat was a term used in the United States in the later 19th century and early 20th century (1872–1904) to refer to members of the Democratic Party who were ideologically aligned with fiscal conservatism or classical liberalism, es ...
s led by
Samuel J. Tilden and
Grover Cleveland
Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837June 24, 1908) was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States, serving from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. He was the first U.S. president to serve nonconsecutive terms and the first Hist ...
, who represented mercantile, banking, and railroad interests; opposed
imperialism
Imperialism is the maintaining and extending of Power (international relations), power over foreign nations, particularly through expansionism, employing both hard power (military and economic power) and soft power (diplomatic power and cultura ...
and overseas expansion; fought for the
gold standard
A gold standard is a backed currency, monetary system in which the standard economics, economic unit of account is based on a fixed quantity of gold. The gold standard was the basis for the international monetary system from the 1870s to the ...
; opposed
bimetallism
Bimetallism, also known as the bimetallic standard, is a monetary standard in which the value of the monetary unit is defined as equivalent to certain quantities of two metals, typically gold and silver, creating a fixed Exchange rate, rate of ...
; and crusaded against corruption, high taxes and tariffs. Cleveland was elected to non-consecutive presidential terms in
1884
Events January
* January 4 – The Fabian Society is founded in London to promote gradualist social progress.
* January 5 – Gilbert and Sullivan's comic opera '' Princess Ida'', a satire on feminism, premières at the Savoy The ...
and
1892
In Samoa, this was the only leap year spanned to 367 days as July 4 repeated. This means that the International Date Line was drawn from the east of the country to go west.
Events
January
* January 1 – Ellis Island begins processing imm ...
.
20th century
Progressive era

Agrarian Democrats demanding
free silver, drawing on Populist ideas, overthrew the Bourbon Democrats in 1896 and nominated
William Jennings Bryan
William Jennings Bryan (March 19, 1860 – July 26, 1925) was an American lawyer, orator, and politician. He was a dominant force in the History of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, running three times as the party' ...
for the presidency (a nomination repeated by Democrats in 1900 and 1908). Bryan waged a vigorous campaign attacking Eastern moneyed interests, but he lost to Republican
William McKinley
William McKinley (January 29, 1843September 14, 1901) was the 25th president of the United States, serving from 1897 until Assassination of William McKinley, his assassination in 1901. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Repub ...
.
The Democrats took control of the House in 1910, and
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was the 28th president of the United States, serving from 1913 to 1921. He was the only History of the Democratic Party (United States), Democrat to serve as president during the Prog ...
won election as president in 1912 (when the Republicans split) and 1916. Wilson effectively led Congress to put to rest the issues of tariffs, money, and antitrust, which had dominated politics for 40 years, with new progressive laws. He failed to secure Senate passage of the
Versailles Treaty
The Treaty of Versailles was a peace treaty signed on 28 June 1919. As the most important treaty of World War I, it ended the state of war between Germany and most of the Allied Powers. It was signed in the Palace of Versailles, exactl ...
(ending the war with Germany and joining the League of Nations). The weakened party was deeply divided by issues such as the KKK and prohibition in the 1920s. However, it did organize new ethnic voters in Northern cities.
After
World War I
World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
ended and continuing through the
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...
, the Democratic and Republican Parties both largely believed in
American exceptionalism
American exceptionalism is the belief that the United States is either distinctive, unique, or exemplary compared to other nations. Proponents argue that the Culture of the United States, values, Politics of the United States, political system ...
over European monarchies and
state socialism
State socialism is a political and economic ideology within the socialist movement that advocates state ownership of the means of production. This is intended either as a temporary measure, or as a characteristic of socialism in the transition ...
that existed elsewhere in the world.
1930s–1960s and the rise of the New Deal coalition

The
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...
in 1929 that began under Republican President
Herbert Hoover
Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964) was the 31st president of the United States, serving from 1929 to 1933. A wealthy mining engineer before his presidency, Hoover led the wartime Commission for Relief in Belgium and ...
and the Republican Congress set the stage for a more liberal government as the Democrats controlled the House of Representatives nearly uninterrupted from 1930 until 1994, the Senate for 44 of 48 years from 1930, and won most presidential elections until 1968.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), also known as FDR, was the 32nd president of the United States, serving from 1933 until his death in 1945. He is the longest-serving U.S. president, and the only one to have served ...
, elected to the presidency in 1932, came forth with federal government programs called the
New Deal
The New Deal was a series of wide-reaching economic, social, and political reforms enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1938, in response to the Great Depression in the United States, Great Depressi ...
. New Deal liberalism meant the regulation of business (especially finance and banking) and the promotion of labor unions as well as federal spending to aid the unemployed, help distressed farmers and undertake large-scale public works projects. It marked the start of the American welfare state. The opponents, who stressed opposition to unions, support for business and low taxes, started calling themselves "conservatives".
Until the 1980s, the Democratic Party was a coalition of two parties divided by the Mason–Dixon line: liberal Democrats in the North and culturally conservative voters in the South, who though benefitting from many of the New Deal public works projects, opposed increasing
civil rights
Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' political freedom, freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and ...
initiatives advocated by northeastern liberals. The polarization grew stronger after Roosevelt died. Southern Democrats formed a key part of the bipartisan
conservative coalition
The conservative coalition, founded in 1937, was an unofficial alliance of members of the United States Congress which brought together the conservative wings of the Republican and Democratic parties to oppose President Franklin Delano Rooseve ...
in an alliance with most of the Midwestern Republicans. The economically activist philosophy of Franklin D. Roosevelt, which has strongly influenced
American liberalism
Liberalism in the United States is based on concepts of unalienable rights of the individual. The fundamental liberal ideals of consent of the governed, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, the separation of church and st ...
, shaped much of the party's economic agenda after 1932. From the 1930s to the mid-1960s, the liberal
New Deal coalition
The New Deal coalition was an American political coalition that supported the Democratic Party beginning in 1932. The coalition is named after President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal programs, and the follow-up Democratic presidents. It was ...
usually controlled the presidency while the conservative coalition usually controlled Congress.
1960s–1980s and the collapse of the New Deal coalition
Issues facing parties and the United States after World War II included the
Cold War
The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...
and the
civil rights movement. Republicans attracted conservatives and, after the 1960s, white Southerners from the Democratic coalition with their use of the
Southern strategy and resistance to New Deal and
Great Society
The Great Society was a series of domestic programs enacted by President Lyndon B. Johnson in the United States between 1964 and 1968, aimed at eliminating poverty, reducing racial injustice, and expanding social welfare in the country. Johnso ...
liberalism. Until the 1950s, African Americans had traditionally supported the Republican Party because of its anti-slavery civil rights policies. Following the passage of the
Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 () is a landmark civil rights and United States labor law, labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on Race (human categorization), race, Person of color, color, religion, sex, and nationa ...
and
Voting Rights Act of 1965
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is a landmark piece of federal legislation in the United States that prohibits racial discrimination in voting. It was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson during the height of the civil rights move ...
, the Southern states became more reliably Republican in presidential politics, while Northeastern states became more reliably Democratic.
Studies show that Southern whites, which were a core constituency in the Democratic Party, shifted to the Republican Party due to
racial backlash and
social conservatism
Social conservatism is a political philosophy and a variety of conservatism which places emphasis on Tradition#In political and religious discourse, traditional social structures over Cultural pluralism, social pluralism. Social conservatives ...
.
The election of President
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), also known as JFK, was the 35th president of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. He was the first Roman Catholic and youngest person elected p ...
from Massachusetts in 1960 partially reflected this shift. In the campaign, Kennedy attracted a new generation of younger voters. In his agenda dubbed the
New Frontier
The term ''New Frontier'' was used by Democratic presidential candidate John F. Kennedy in his acceptance speech, delivered July 15, in the 1960 United States presidential election to the Democratic National Convention at the Los Angeles Memo ...
, Kennedy introduced a host of social programs and public works projects, along with enhanced support of the
space program
A space program is an organized effort by a government or a company with a goal related to outer space.
Lists of space programs include:
* List of government space agencies
* List of private spaceflight companies
* List of human spaceflight prog ...
, proposing a crewed spacecraft
trip to the moon by the end of the decade. He pushed for civil rights initiatives and proposed the
Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 () is a landmark civil rights and United States labor law, labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on Race (human categorization), race, Person of color, color, religion, sex, and nationa ...
, but with his
assassination
Assassination is the willful killing, by a sudden, secret, or planned attack, of a personespecially if prominent or important. It may be prompted by political, ideological, religious, financial, or military motives.
Assassinations are orde ...
in November 1963, he was not able to see its passage.
Kennedy's successor
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), also known as LBJ, was the 36th president of the United States, serving from 1963 to 1969. He became president after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, under whom he had served a ...
was able to persuade the largely conservative Congress to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and with a more progressive Congress in 1965 passed much of the
Great Society
The Great Society was a series of domestic programs enacted by President Lyndon B. Johnson in the United States between 1964 and 1968, aimed at eliminating poverty, reducing racial injustice, and expanding social welfare in the country. Johnso ...
, including
Medicare and
Medicaid
Medicaid is a government program in the United States that provides health insurance for adults and children with limited income and resources. The program is partially funded and primarily managed by U.S. state, state governments, which also h ...
, which consisted of an array of social programs designed to help the poor, sick, and elderly. Kennedy and Johnson's advocacy of civil rights further solidified black support for the Democrats but had the effect of alienating Southern whites who would eventually gravitate toward the Republican Party, particularly after the election of
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan (February 6, 1911 – June 5, 2004) was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He was a member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party a ...
to the presidency in 1980. Many conservative
Southern Democrats
Southern Democrats are members of the U.S. Democratic Party who reside in the Southern United States.
Before the American Civil War, Southern Democrats mostly believed in Jacksonian democracy. In the 19th century, they defended slavery in the ...
defected to the
Republican Party, beginning with the passage of the
Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 () is a landmark civil rights and United States labor law, labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on Race (human categorization), race, Person of color, color, religion, sex, and nationa ...
and the general leftward shift of the party.
[
The United States' involvement in the ]Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (1 November 1955 – 30 April 1975) was an armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fought between North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) and their allies. North Vietnam w ...
in the 1960s was another divisive issue that further fractured the fault lines of the Democrats' coalition. After the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution or the Southeast Asia Resolution, , was a joint resolution that the United States Congress passed on August 7, 1964, in response to the Gulf of Tonkin incident.
It is of historic significance because it gave U.S. ...
in 1964, President Johnson committed a large contingency of combat troops to Vietnam, but the escalation failed to drive the Viet Cong
The Viet Cong (VC) was an epithet and umbrella term to refer to the communist-driven armed movement and united front organization in South Vietnam. It was formally organized as and led by the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam, and ...
from South Vietnam, resulting in an increasing quagmire, which by 1968 had become the subject of widespread anti-war protests in the United States and elsewhere. With increasing casualties and nightly news reports bringing home troubling images from Vietnam, the costly military engagement became increasingly unpopular, alienating many of the kinds of young voters that the Democrats had attracted in the early 1960s. The protests that year along with assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr.
Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister, civil and political rights, civil rights activist and political philosopher who was a leader of the civil rights move ...
and Democratic presidential candidate Senator Robert F. Kennedy
Robert Francis Kennedy (November 20, 1925 – June 6, 1968), also known as RFK, was an American politician and lawyer. He served as the 64th United States attorney general from January 1961 to September 1964, and as a U.S. senator from New Yo ...
(younger brother of John F. Kennedy) climaxed in turbulence at the hotly-contested Democratic National Convention
The Democratic National Convention (DNC) is a series of presidential nominating conventions held every four years since 1832 by the United States Democratic Party. They have been administered by the Democratic National Committee since the 18 ...
that summer in Chicago (which amongst the ensuing turmoil inside and outside of the convention hall nominated Vice President Hubert Humphrey
Hubert Horatio Humphrey Jr. (May 27, 1911 – January 13, 1978) was an American politician who served from 1965 to 1969 as the 38th vice president of the United States. He twice served in the United States Senate, representing Minnesota from 19 ...
) in a series of events that proved to mark a significant turning point in the decline of the Democratic Party's broad coalition.
Republican presidential nominee Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 until Resignation of Richard Nixon, his resignation in 1974. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican ...
was able to capitalize on the confusion of the Democrats that year, and won the 1968 election to become the 37th president. He won re-election in a landslide
Landslides, also known as landslips, rockslips or rockslides, are several forms of mass wasting that may include a wide range of ground movements, such as rockfalls, mudflows, shallow or deep-seated slope failures and debris flows. Landslides ...
in 1972 against Democratic nominee George McGovern
George Stanley McGovern (July 19, 1922 – October 21, 2012) was an American politician, diplomat, and historian who was a U.S. representative and three-term U.S. senator from South Dakota, and the Democratic Party (United States), Democ ...
, who like Robert F. Kennedy, reached out to the younger anti-war and counterculture voters, but unlike Kennedy, was not able to appeal to the party's more traditional white working-class constituencies. During Nixon's second term, his presidency was rocked by the Watergate
The Watergate scandal was a major political scandal in the United States involving the administration of President Richard Nixon. The scandal began in 1972 and ultimately led to Nixon's resignation in 1974, in August of that year. It revol ...
scandal, which forced him to resign in 1974. He was succeeded by vice president Gerald Ford
Gerald Rudolph Ford Jr. (born Leslie Lynch King Jr.; July 14, 1913December 26, 2006) was the 38th president of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, Ford assumed the p ...
, who served a brief tenure.
Watergate offered the Democrats an opportunity to recoup, and their nominee Jimmy Carter
James Earl Carter Jr. (October 1, 1924December 29, 2024) was an American politician and humanitarian who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party ...
won the 1976 presidential election. With the initial support of evangelical
Evangelicalism (), also called evangelical Christianity or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide, interdenominational movement within Protestantism, Protestant Christianity that emphasizes evangelism, or the preaching and spreading of th ...
Christian voters in the South, Carter was temporarily able to reunite the disparate factions within the party, but inflation and the Iran Hostage Crisis
The Iran hostage crisis () began on November 4, 1979, when 66 Americans, including diplomats and other civilian personnel, were taken hostage at the Embassy of the United States in Tehran, with 52 of them being held until January 20, 1981. Th ...
of 1979–1980 took their toll, resulting in a landslide
Landslides, also known as landslips, rockslips or rockslides, are several forms of mass wasting that may include a wide range of ground movements, such as rockfalls, mudflows, shallow or deep-seated slope failures and debris flows. Landslides ...
victory for Republican presidential nominee Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan (February 6, 1911 – June 5, 2004) was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He was a member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party a ...
in 1980, which shifted the political landscape in favor of the Republicans for years to come. The influx of conservative Democrats into the Republican Party is often cited as a reason for the Republican Party's shift further to the right during the late 20th century as well as the shift of its base from the Northeast and Midwest to the South.
1990s and Third Way centrism
With the ascendancy of the Republicans under Ronald Reagan, the Democrats searched for ways to respond yet were unable to succeed by running traditional candidates, such as former vice president and Democratic presidential nominee Walter Mondale
Walter Frederick "Fritz" Mondale (January 5, 1928April 19, 2021) was the 42nd vice president of the United States serving from 1977 to 1981 under President Jimmy Carter. He previously served as a U.S. senator from Minnesota from 1964 to 1976. ...
and Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis
Michael Stanley Dukakis ( ; born November 3, 1933) is an American politician and lawyer who served as governor of Massachusetts from 1975 to 1979 and from 1983 to 1991. He is the longest-serving governor in Massachusetts history and only the s ...
, who lost to Reagan and George H.W. Bush
George Herbert Walker BushBefore the outcome of the 2000 United States presidential election, he was usually referred to simply as "George Bush" but became more commonly known as "George H. W. Bush", "Bush Senior," "Bush 41," and even "Bush th ...
in the 1984
Events
January
* January 1 – The Bornean Sultanate of Brunei gains full independence from the United Kingdom, having become a British protectorate in 1888.
* January 7 – Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeas ...
and 1988 presidential elections, respectively. Many Democrats attached their hopes to the future star of Gary Hart
Gary Warren Hart (''né'' Hartpence; born November 28, 1936) is an American politician, diplomat, and lawyer. He was the front-runner for the 1984 and 1988 Democratic presidential nominations, until in 1988, he dropped out amid revelations of ex ...
, who had challenged Mondale in the 1984 primaries running on a theme of "New Ideas"; and in the subsequent 1988 primaries became the de facto front-runner and virtual "shoo-in" for the Democratic presidential nomination before a sex scandal ended his campaign. The party nevertheless began to seek out a younger generation of leaders, who like Hart had been inspired by the pragmatic idealism of John F. Kennedy.
Arkansas governor Bill Clinton
William Jefferson Clinton (né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician and lawyer who was the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, ...
was one such figure, who was elected president in 1992 as the Democratic nominee. The Democratic Leadership Council
The Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) was a non-profit 501(c)(4) corporation that was active from 1985 to 2011. Founded and directed by Al From, it argued that the United States Democratic Party should shift away from the leftward turn it had ...
was a campaign organization connected to Clinton that advocated a realignment and triangulation
In trigonometry and geometry, triangulation is the process of determining the location of a point by forming triangles to the point from known points.
Applications
In surveying
Specifically in surveying, triangulation involves only angle m ...
under the re-branded "New Democrat
New Democrats may refer to:
* New Democratic Party, a social democratic party in Canada
* New Democrats (United States), the ideological centrist faction of the Democratic Party
** New Democrat Coalition, the related caucus in the United States H ...
" label. The party adopted a synthesis of neoliberal
Neoliberalism is a political and economic ideology that advocates for free-market capitalism, which became dominant in policy-making from the late 20th century onward. The term has multiple, competing definitions, and is most often used pej ...
economic policies
''Economic Policy'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal published by Oxford Academic on behalf of the Centre for Economic Policy Research, the Center for Economic Studies (University of Munich), and the Paris School of Economics. The jo ...
with cultural liberalism
Cultural liberalism is a social philosophy which expresses the social dimension of liberalism and advocates the freedom of individuals to choose whether to conform to cultural norms. In the words of Henry David Thoreau, it is often expressed ...
, with the voter base after Reagan having shifted considerably to the right
Rights are law, legal, social, or ethics, ethical principles of freedom or Entitlement (fair division), entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people according to some legal sy ...
. In an effort to appeal both to liberals and to fiscal conservatives, Democrats began to advocate for a balanced budget
A balanced budget (particularly that of a government) is a budget in which revenues are equal to expenditures. Thus, neither a budget deficit nor a budget surplus exists (the accounts "balance"). More generally, it is a budget that has no budge ...
and market economy
A market economy is an economic system in which the decisions regarding investment, production, and distribution to the consumers are guided by the price signals created by the forces of supply and demand. The major characteristic of a mark ...
tempered by government intervention
A market intervention is a policy or measure that modifies or interferes with a market, typically done in the form of state action, but also by philanthropic and political-action groups. Market interventions can be done for a number of reas ...
(mixed economy
A mixed economy is an economic system that includes both elements associated with capitalism, such as private businesses, and with socialism, such as nationalized government services.
More specifically, a mixed economy may be variously de ...
), along with a continued emphasis on social justice
Social justice is justice in relation to the distribution of wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society where individuals' rights are recognized and protected. In Western and Asian cultures, the concept of social justice has of ...
and affirmative action
Affirmative action (also sometimes called reservations, alternative access, positive discrimination or positive action in various countries' laws and policies) refers to a set of policies and practices within a government or organization seeking ...
. The economic policy adopted by the Democratic Party, including the former Clinton administration
Bill Clinton's tenure as the 42nd president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 1993, and ended on January 20, 2001. Clinton, a Democrat from Arkansas, took office following his victory over Republican in ...
, has been referred to as "Third Way
The Third Way is a predominantly centrist political position that attempts to reconcile centre-right and centre-left politics by advocating a varying synthesis of Right-wing economics, right-wing economic and Left-wing politics, left-wing so ...
".
The Democrats lost control of Congress in the 1994 elections
The following elections occurred in the year 1994.
Africa
* 1994 Botswana general election
* 1994 Guinea-Bissau general election
* 1994 Malawian general election
* 1994 Mozambican general election
* 1994 Namibian general election
* 1994 South Afr ...
to the Republicans, however, in 1996
1996 was designated as:
* International Year for the Eradication of Poverty
Events January
* January 8 – A Zairean cargo plane crashes into a crowded market in the center of the capital city of the Democratic Republic of the Congo ...
Clinton was re-elected, becoming the first Democratic president since Franklin D. Roosevelt to win a second full term. Clinton's vice president Al Gore
Albert Arnold Gore Jr. (born March 31, 1948) is an American former politician, businessman, and environmentalist who served as the 45th vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton. He previously served as ...
ran to succeed him as president, and won the popular vote
Popularity or social status is the quality of being well liked, admired or well known to a particular group.
Popular may also refer to:
In sociology
* Popular culture
* Popular fiction
* Popular music
* Popular science
* Populace, the tota ...
, but after a controversial election dispute over a Florida recount settled by the U.S. Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that turn on question ...
(which ruled 5–4 in favor of Bush), he lost the 2000 election to Republican opponent George W. Bush
George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician and businessman who was the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Bush family and the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he i ...
in the Electoral College
An electoral college is a body whose task is to elect a candidate to a particular office. It is mostly used in the political context for a constitutional body that appoints the head of state or government, and sometimes the upper parliament ...
.
21st century
In the wake of the 2001 terrorist attacks
The following is a list of terrorist incidents that were not carried out by a state or its forces (see state terrorism and state-sponsored terrorism). Assassinations are presented in List of assassinations and unsuccessful attempts at List o ...
on the World Trade Center
World Trade Centers are the hundreds of sites recognized by the World Trade Centers Association.
World Trade Center may also refer to:
Buildings
* World Trade Center (1973–2001), a building complex that was destroyed during the September 11 at ...
and the Pentagon
The Pentagon is the headquarters building of the United States Department of Defense, in Arlington County, Virginia, across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C. The building was constructed on an accelerated schedule during World War II. As ...
as well as the growing concern over global warming
Present-day climate change includes both global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its wider effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes ...
, some of the party's key issues in the early 21st century have included combating terrorism
Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of violence against non-combatants to achieve political or ideological aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violence during peacetime or in the context of war aga ...
while preserving human rights, expanding access to health care, labor rights
Labor rights or workers' rights are both legal rights and human rights relating to labor relations between workers and employers. These rights are codified in national and international labor and employment law. In general, the ...
, and environmental protection. Democrats regained majority control of both the House and the Senate in the 2006 elections
The following elections occurred in the year 2006.
* Elections in 2006
* Electoral calendar 2006
* 2006 Acehnese regional election
* 2006 American Samoan legislative election
* 2006 Bahraini parliamentary election
* 2006 Costa Rican presidential e ...
. Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...
won the Democratic Party's nomination and was elected as the first African American president in 2008. Under the Obama presidency, the party moved forward reforms including an economic stimulus
In economics, stimulus refers to attempts to use monetary policy or fiscal policy (or stabilization policy in general) to stimulate the economy. Stimulus can also refer to monetary policies such as lowering interest rates and quantitative e ...
package, the Dodd–Frank financial reform act and, in its biggest impact, reshaped the nation's healthcare with the Affordable Care Act
The Affordable Care Act (ACA), formally known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) and informally as Obamacare, is a landmark U.S. federal statute enacted by the 111th United States Congress and signed into law by Presid ...
.
2010s and the Obama era
In the 2010 midterm elections
Elections were held in the United States on November 2, 2010, in the middle of Democratic President Barack Obama's first term. Republicans ended unified Democratic control of Congress and the presidency by winning a majority in the House of R ...
, the Democratic Party lost control of the House as well as its majorities in several state legislatures and governorships. The 2010 elections also marked the end of the Democratic Party's electoral dominance in the Southern United States
The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, Dixieland, or simply the South) is List of regions of the United States, census regions defined by the United States Cens ...
.
In the 2012 elections, President Obama was re-elected, but the party remained in the minority in the House of Representatives and lost control of the Senate in the 2014 midterm elections. After the 2016 election of Donald Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...
, who lost the popular vote
Popularity or social status is the quality of being well liked, admired or well known to a particular group.
Popular may also refer to:
In sociology
* Popular culture
* Popular fiction
* Popular music
* Popular science
* Populace, the tota ...
to Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton
Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, lawyer and diplomat. She was the 67th United States secretary of state in the administration of Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, a U.S. senator represent ...
, the Democratic Party transitioned into the role of an opposition party and held neither the presidency nor Congress for two years. However, the party won back the House in the 2018 midterm elections under the leadership of Nancy Pelosi
Nancy Patricia Pelosi ( ; ; born March 26, 1940) is an American politician who was the List of Speakers of the United States House of Representatives, 52nd speaker of the United States House of Representatives, serving from 2007 to 2011 an ...
.
Democrats were extremely critical of President Trump, particularly his policies on immigration, healthcare, and abortion, as well as his response to the COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...
. In December 2019, Democrats in the House of Representatives impeached Trump, although he was acquitted in the Republican-controlled Senate.
2020s
In November 2020, Democrat Joe Biden
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...
defeated Trump to win the 2020 presidential election. After Trump attempted to challenge the election, he began his term with extremely narrow Democratic majorities in the U.S. House and Senate. During the Biden presidency, the party had been characterized as adopting an increasingly progressive economic agenda. In 2022, Biden appointed Ketanji Brown Jackson
Ketanji Onyika Brown Jackson (née Brown; ; born September 14, 1970) is an American lawyer and jurist who is an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Jackson Ketanji Brown Jackson Supreme Court nomination, was nominated ...
, the first Black woman on the Supreme Court
In most legal jurisdictions, a supreme court, also known as a court of last resort, apex court, high (or final) court of appeal, and court of final appeal, is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...
. However, she was replacing liberal justice Stephen Breyer
Stephen Gerald Breyer ( ; born August 15, 1938) is an American lawyer and retired jurist who served as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1994 until his retirement in 2022. He was nominated by President Bill Clinton, and r ...
, thus she did not alter the court's 6–3 split between conservatives (the majority) and liberals. After '' Dobbs v. Jackson'' (decided June 24, 2022), which led to abortion bans in much of the country, the Democratic Party rallied behind abortion rights
Abortion-rights movements, also self-styled as pro-choice movements, are movements that advocate for legal access to induced abortion services, including elective abortion. They seek to represent and support women who wish to terminate their p ...
.
In the 2022 midterm elections, Democrats dramatically outperformed historical trends and a widely anticipated red wave
''Red Wave: 4 Underground Bands from the USSR'' was a split double album released in 1986 and featuring Russian rock bands Aquarium, Kino, Alisa, and Strannye Igry (Strange Games), all from Leningrad. It was the first release of Russian rock ...
did not materialize. The party only narrowly lost its majority in the U.S. House and expanded its majority in the U.S. Senate, along with several gains at the state level.["State Partisan Composition,"](_blank)
May 23, 2023, National Conference of State Legislatures
The National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL), established in 1975, is a "nonpartisan public officials' association composed of sitting state legislators" from the states, territories and commonwealths of the United States.
Background ...
. Retrieved July 4, 2023["Statehouse Democrats Embrace an Unfamiliar Reality: Full Power,"](_blank)
January 18, 2023, ''New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
,'' retrieved July 4, 2023Associated Press
The Associated Press (AP) is an American not-for-profit organization, not-for-profit news agency headquartered in New York City.
Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association, and produces news reports that are dist ...
"Midterm election trifectas: Democrats won full government control in these states,"
November 10, 2022, ''Fox News
The Fox News Channel (FNC), commonly known as Fox News, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Conservatism in the United States, conservative List of news television channels, news and political commentary Television stati ...
,'' retrieved July 4, 2023[Thomas Cronin, Cronin, Tom and Bob Loevy]
"American federalism: States veer far left or far right,"
, July 1, 2023, updated July 2, 2023, ''Colorado Springs Gazette,'' retrieved July 4, 2023
In July 2024, after a series of Age and health concerns about Joe Biden, age and health concerns, Biden became the first incumbent president since Withdrawal of Lyndon B. Johnson from the 1968 United States presidential election, Lyndon B. Johnson in 1968 to Withdrawal of Joe Biden from the 2024 United States presidential election, withdraw from running for reelection, the first since the 19th century to withdraw after serving only one term, and the only one to ever withdraw after already winning Democratic Party presidential primaries, the primaries.
Vice President Kamala Harris—who became Biden's replacement on the ballot after his withdrawal from the race—became the first black women, black woman to be nominated by a major party, but she was defeated in the 2024 United States presidential election, 2024 election by Donald Trump. Harris lost the United States electoral college, electoral college 312–226 (including all seven of the anticipated swing states) as well as the popular vote, becoming the first Democratic candidate to do so since John Kerry in 2004, amid what was a global anti-incumbent backlash.
Current status
As of 2025, Democrats hold 23 List of United States governors, state governorships, 17 List of United States state legislatures, state legislatures, 15 state government Government trifecta, trifectas, and the mayorships in the majority of the country's major cities. Three of the nine current U.S. Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that turn on question ...
justices were appointed by Democratic presidents. By registered members, the Democratic Party is the largest party in the U.S. and the List of largest political parties, fourth largest in the world. All totaled, 16 Democrats have served as president of the United States.
Name and symbols
The Democratic-Republican Party
The Democratic-Republican Party (also referred to by historians as the Republican Party or the Jeffersonian Republican Party), was an American political party founded by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison in the early 1790s. It championed li ...
splintered in 1824 into the short-lived National Republican Party and the Jacksonian movement which in 1828 became the Democratic Party. Under the Jacksonian era, the term "The Democracy" was in use by the party, but the name "Democratic Party" was eventually settled upon and became the official name in 1844. Members of the party are called "Democrats" or "Dems".
The most common mascot symbol for the party has been the donkey, or jackass. Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before Presidency of Andrew Jackson, his presidency, he rose to fame as a general in the U.S. Army and served in both houses ...
's enemies twisted his name to "jackass" as a term of ridicule regarding a stupid and stubborn animal. However, the Democrats liked the common-man implications and picked it up too, therefore the image persisted and evolved. Its most lasting impression came from the cartoons of Thomas Nast from 1870 in ''Harper's Magazine, Harper's Weekly''. Cartoonists followed Nast and used the donkey to represent the Democrats and the elephant to represent the Republicans.
In the early 20th century, the traditional symbol of the Democratic Party in Indiana, Kentucky, Oklahoma and Ohio was the rooster, as opposed to the Republican eagle. The rooster was also adopted as an official symbol of the national Democratic Party. In 1904, the Alabama Democratic Party chose, as the logo to put on its ballots, a rooster with the motto "White supremacy – For the right." The words "White supremacy" were replaced with "Democrats" in 1966. In 1996, the Alabama Democratic Party dropped the rooster, citing racist and white supremacist connotations linked with the symbol. The rooster symbol still appears on Oklahoma, Kentucky, Indiana, and West Virginia ballots. In New York, the Democratic ballot symbol is a five-pointed star.
Although both major political parties (and many minor ones) use the traditional American colors of red, white, and blue in their marketing and representations, since 2000 United States presidential election, election night 2000 blue has become the identifying color for the Democratic Party while red has become the identifying color for the Republican Party. That night, for the first time all major broadcast television networks used the same color scheme for the electoral map: Red states and blue states, blue states for Al Gore
Albert Arnold Gore Jr. (born March 31, 1948) is an American former politician, businessman, and environmentalist who served as the 45th vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton. He previously served as ...
(Democratic nominee) and red states for George W. Bush
George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician and businessman who was the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Bush family and the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he i ...
(Republican nominee). Since then, the color blue has been widely used by the media to represent the party. This is contrary to common practice outside of the United States where blue is the traditional color of the right and red the color of the left.
In 2025, a new logo was introduced, which incorporates a white donkey facing to the right instead of the left, with three blue stars in the center instead of four, on a blue background. The modified donkey design has been characterized by some as resembling a piñata.
Jefferson-Jackson Day is the annual fundraising event (dinner) held by Democratic Party organizations across the United States. It is named after Presidents Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (, 1743July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was the primary author of the United States Declaration of Indepe ...
and Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before Presidency of Andrew Jackson, his presidency, he rose to fame as a general in the U.S. Army and served in both houses ...
, whom the party regards as its distinguished early leaders.
The song "Happy Days Are Here Again" is the unofficial song of the Democratic Party. It was used prominently when Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), also known as FDR, was the 32nd president of the United States, serving from 1933 until his death in 1945. He is the longest-serving U.S. president, and the only one to have served ...
was nominated for president at the 1932 Democratic National Convention and remains a sentimental favorite for Democrats. For example, Paul Shaffer played the theme on the ''Late Show with David Letterman'' after the Democrats won Congress in 2006. "Don't Stop (Fleetwood Mac song), Don't Stop" by Fleetwood Mac was adopted by Bill Clinton
William Jefferson Clinton (né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician and lawyer who was the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, ...
's presidential campaign in 1992 and has endured as a popular Democratic song. The emotionally similar song "Beautiful Day" by the band U2 has also become a favorite theme song for Democratic candidates. John Kerry used the song during his 2004 presidential campaign and several Democratic congressional candidates used it as a celebratory tune in 2006.
As a traditional anthem for its presidential nominating convention, Aaron Copland's "Fanfare for the Common Man" is traditionally performed at the beginning of the Democratic National Convention.
Structure
National committee
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) is responsible for promoting Democratic campaign activities. While the DNC is responsible for overseeing the process of writing the Democratic Platform, the DNC is more focused on campaign and organizational strategy than public policy. In presidential elections, it supervises the Democratic National Convention. The national convention is subject to the charter of the party and the ultimate authority within the Democratic Party when it is in session, with the DNC running the party's organization at other times. Since , the DNC has been chaired by Ken Martin.
State parties
Each state also has a state committee, made up of elected committee members as well as ex officio committee members (usually elected officials and representatives of major constituencies), which in turn elects a chair. County, town, city, and ward committees generally are composed of individuals elected at the local level. State and local committees often coordinate campaign activities within their jurisdiction, oversee local conventions, and in some cases primaries or caucuses, and may have a role in nominating candidates for elected office under state law. Rarely do they have much direct funding, but in 2005 DNC Chairman Dean began a program (called the "50 State Strategy") of using DNC national funds to assist all state parties and pay for full-time professional staffers.
In addition, state-level party committees operate in the territories of American Samoa Democratic Party, American Samoa, Democratic Party of Guam, Guam, and Democratic Party of the Virgin Islands, Virgin Islands, the commonwealths of Democratic Party (Northern Mariana Islands), Northern Mariana Islands and Democratic Party (Puerto Rico), Puerto Rico, and the District of Columbia Democratic State Committee, District of Columbia, with all but Puerto Rico being active in nominating candidates for both presidential and territorial contests, while Puerto Rico's Democratic Party is organized only to nominate presidential candidates. The Democrats Abroad committee is organized by American voters who reside outside of U.S. territory to nominate presidential candidates. All such party committees are accorded recognition as state parties and are allowed to elect both members to the National Committee as well as delegates to the National Convention.
Major party committees and groups
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) assists party candidates in House races and is chaired by Representative Suzan DelBene of Washington (state), Washington. Similarly, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC), chaired by Senator Gary Peters of Michigan, raises funds for Senate races. The Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC), chaired by Majority Leader of the New York State Senate Andrea Stewart-Cousins, is a smaller organization that focuses on state legislative races. The Democratic Governors Association (DGA) is an organization supporting the candidacies of Democratic gubernatorial nominees and incumbents. Likewise, the mayors of the largest cities and urban centers convene as the National Conference of Democratic Mayors.
The DNC sponsors the College Democrats of America (CDA), a student-outreach organization with the goal of training and engaging a new generation of Democratic activists. Democrats Abroad is the organization for Americans living outside the United States. They work to advance the party's goals and encourage Americans living abroad to support the Democrats. The Young Democrats of America (YDA) and the High School Democrats of America (HSDA) are young adult and youth-led organizations respectively that attempt to draw in and mobilize young people for Democratic candidates but operates outside of the DNC.
Political positions
The 21st century Democratic Party differs from other Centre-left politics, center-left parties around the world in its ideological orientation, in part due to its Homogeneity and heterogeneity, heterogenous demographic composition. In particular, the Democratic Party's ideology derives from being supported by both racial minorities, particularly African Americans
African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa ...
, as well as White voters with high educational attainment in the United States, educational attainment.
This makes the Democratic Party different, because it is a Big tent, big tent party, neither a Classical liberalism, classically liberal nor a Social democracy, social democratic party ideologically. Its voting demographics are heavily educationally and racially-polarized, but not income polarized. The Democratic Party is weakest among White voters without college degrees in the 21st century. Higher educational attainment is strongly correlated with higher income and wealth, and also strongly correlated with increased ideological support for the Democratic Party's positions among White voters.
This derives in part from unique regional characteristics of the United States, particularly the Southern United States
The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, Dixieland, or simply the South) is List of regions of the United States, census regions defined by the United States Cens ...
. Racial polarization is extremely high in the Southern United States, with Black Southerners almost entirely voting for the Democratic Party, and White Southerners almost entirely voting for the Republican Party. Also, White Southerners with college degrees are strongly Republican, unlike in most of the rest of the country. African Americans
African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa ...
continue to have the lowest incomes of any racial group in the United States.
The Democratic Party's contemporary liberalism has its origins in the Puritans of New England, with their emphasis on education and science dating back to the colonial era and the Scientific Revolution. This liberalism is older than the classical liberalism or social democracy of the 19th century.
The Democratic party's social positions derive from those of the New Left, that is cultural liberalism
Cultural liberalism is a social philosophy which expresses the social dimension of liberalism and advocates the freedom of individuals to choose whether to conform to cultural norms. In the words of Henry David Thoreau, it is often expressed ...
. These include feminism, LGBT rights, Drug liberalization, drug policy reforms, and environmentalism. The party's platform favors a generous welfare state and a greater measure of social and economic equality.[Larry E. Sullivan. ''The SAGE glossary of the social and behavioral sciences'' (2009). p. 291: "This liberalism favors a generous welfare state and a greater measure of social and economic equality. Liberty thus exists when all citizens have access to basic necessities such as education, healthcare, and economic opportunities."] On social issues, it advocates for Abortion-rights movements, the continued legality of abortion, the legalization of marijuana
The legality of cannabis for medical and recreational use varies by country, in terms of its possession, distribution, and cultivation, and (in regards to medical) how it can be consumed and what medical conditions it can be used for. The ...
, and LGBT rights.
Economic issues
The social safety net and strong labor unions
A trade union (British English) or labor union (American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages ...
have been at the heart of Democratic economic policy since the New Deal
The New Deal was a series of wide-reaching economic, social, and political reforms enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1938, in response to the Great Depression in the United States, Great Depressi ...
in the 1930s. The Democratic Party's economic policy positions, as measured by votes in Congress, tend to align with those of the middle class. Democrats support a progressive tax system, higher Minimum wage in the United States, minimum wages, equal opportunity employment, Social Security (United States), Social Security, universal health care, Education in the United States, public education, and Subsidized housing in the United States, subsidized housing. They also support Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, infrastructure development and clean energy investments to achieve economic development and job creation.
Since the 1990s, the party has at times supported Centrism, centrist economic reforms that cut the size of government and reduced market regulations. The party has generally rejected both Laissez-faire, ''laissez-faire'' economics and market socialism, instead favoring Keynesian economics within a capitalist market-based system.
Fiscal policy
Democrats support a more progressive tax structure to provide more services and reduce economic inequality by making sure that the wealthiest Americans pay more in taxes.
Democrats and Republicans traditionally take differing stances on eradicating poverty. Brady said "Our poverty level is the direct consequence of our weak social policies, which are a direct consequence of weak political actors".
They oppose the cutting of social services, such as Social Security (United States), Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid
Medicaid is a government program in the United States that provides health insurance for adults and children with limited income and resources. The program is partially funded and primarily managed by U.S. state, state governments, which also h ...
, believing it to be harmful to efficiency and social justice
Social justice is justice in relation to the distribution of wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society where individuals' rights are recognized and protected. In Western and Asian cultures, the concept of social justice has of ...
. Democrats believe the benefits of social services in monetary and non-monetary terms are a more Productive and unproductive labour, productive labor force and cultured population and believe that the benefits of this are greater than any benefits that could be derived from lower taxes, especially on top earners, or cuts to social services. Furthermore, Democrats see social services as essential toward providing Positive liberty, positive freedom, freedom derived from economic opportunity. The Democratic-led House of Representatives reinstated the PAYGO (pay-as-you-go) budget rule at the start of the 110th United States Congress, 110th Congress.
Minimum wage
The Democratic Party favors raising the minimum wage. The Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007 was an early component of the Democrats' agenda during the 110th United States Congress, 110th Congress. In 2006, the Democrats supported six state-ballot initiatives to increase the minimum wage and all six initiatives passed.
In 2017, Senate Democrats introduced the Raise the Wage Act which would raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2024. In 2021, Democratic president Joe Biden
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...
proposed increasing the minimum wage to $15 by 2025. In many states controlled by Democrats, the state minimum wage has been increased to a rate above the federal minimum wage.
Health care
Democrats call for "affordable and quality health care" and favor moving toward universal health care in a variety of forms to address rising healthcare costs. Progressive Democrats politicians favor a single-payer health care, single-payer program or Medicare for All, while liberals prefer creating a public health insurance option.
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, signed into law by President Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...
on March 23, 2010, has been one of the most significant pushes for universal health care. As of December 2019, more than 20 million Americans have gained health insurance under the Affordable Care Act.
Education
Democrats favor improving public education by raising school standards and reforming the Head Start (program), Head Start program. They also support universal preschool, expanding access to primary education, including through charter schools, and are generally opposed to school voucher programs. They call for addressing student loan debt and reforms to reduce college tuition. Other proposals have included tuition-free public universities and reform of standardized testing. Democrats have the long-term aim of having publicly funded college education with low tuition fees (like in much of Europe and Canada), which would be available to every eligible American student. Alternatively, they encourage expanding access to post-secondary education by increasing state funding for student financial aid such as Pell Grants and college tuition tax deductions.
Environment
Democrats believe that the government should protect the environment and have a history of environmentalism. In more recent years, this stance has emphasized renewable energy generation as the basis for an improved economy, greater national security, and general environmental benefits. The Democratic Party is substantially more likely than the Republican Party to support environmental regulation and policies that are supportive of renewable energy.
The Democratic Party also favors expansion of conservation lands and encourages open space and rail travel to relieve highway and airport congestion and improve air quality and the economy as it "believe[s] that communities, environmental interests, and the government should work together to protect resources while ensuring the vitality of local economies. Once Americans were led to believe they had to make a choice between the economy and the environment. They now know this is a false choice".
The foremost environmental concern of the Democratic Party is climate change
Present-day climate change includes both global warming—the ongoing increase in Global surface temperature, global average temperature—and its wider effects on Earth's climate system. Climate variability and change, Climate change in ...
. Democrats, most notably former Vice President Al Gore
Albert Arnold Gore Jr. (born March 31, 1948) is an American former politician, businessman, and environmentalist who served as the 45th vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton. He previously served as ...
, have pressed for stern regulation of greenhouse gases. On October 15, 2007, Gore won the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to build greater knowledge about man-made climate change and laying the foundations for the measures needed to counteract it.
Renewable energy and fossil fuels
Democrats have supported increased domestic renewable energy development, including wind and solar power farms, in an effort to reduce carbon pollution. The party's platform calls for an "all of the above" energy policy including clean energy, natural gas and domestic oil, with the desire of becoming energy independent. The party has supported higher taxes on oil companies and increased regulations on coal power plants, favoring a policy of reducing long-term reliance on fossil fuels. Additionally, the party supports stricter fuel emissions standards to prevent air pollution.
During his presidency, Joe Biden enacted the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, which is the largest allocation of funds for Climate change mitigation, addressing climate change in the history of the United States.
Trade
Like the Republican Party, the Democratic Party has taken widely varying views on international trade throughout its history. The Democratic Party has usually been more supportive of free trade than the Republican Party.
The Democrats dominated the Second Party System and set low tariffs designed to pay for the government but not protect industry. Their opponents the Whigs wanted high protective tariffs but usually were outvoted in Congress. Tariffs soon became a major political issue as the Whigs (1832–1852) and (after 1854) the Republicans wanted to protect their mostly northern industries and constituents by voting for higher tariffs and the Southern Democrats
Southern Democrats are members of the U.S. Democratic Party who reside in the Southern United States.
Before the American Civil War, Southern Democrats mostly believed in Jacksonian democracy. In the 19th century, they defended slavery in the ...
, which had very little industry but imported many goods voted for lower tariffs. After the Second Party System ended in 1854 the Democrats lost control and the new Republican Party had its opportunity to raise rates.
During the Third Party System, Democratic president Grover Cleveland
Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837June 24, 1908) was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States, serving from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. He was the first U.S. president to serve nonconsecutive terms and the first Hist ...
made low tariffs the centerpiece of Democratic Party policies, arguing that high tariffs were an unnecessary and unfair tax on consumers. The South and Western United States, West generally supported low tariffs, while the industrial Northern United States, North high tariffs. During the Fourth Party System, Democratic president Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was the 28th president of the United States, serving from 1913 to 1921. He was the only History of the Democratic Party (United States), Democrat to serve as president during the Prog ...
made a drastic lowering of tariff rates a major priority for his presidency. The 1913 Underwood Tariff cut rates, and the new revenues generated by the federal income tax made tariffs much less important in terms of economic impact and political rhetoric.
During the Fifth Party System, the Reciprocal Tariff Act of 1934 was enacted during Franklin D. Roosevelt, FDR's administration, marking a sharp departure from the era of protectionism in the United States. American duties on foreign products declined from an average of 46% in 1934 to 12% by 1962. After World War II, the U.S. promoted the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) established in 1947 during the Presidency of Harry S. Truman, Truman administration, to minimize tariffs liberalize trade among all capitalist countries.[John H. Barton, Judith L. Goldstein, Timothy E. Josling, and Richard H. Steinberg, ''The Evolution of the Trade Regime: Politics, Law, and Economics of the GATT and the WTO'' (2008)]
In the 1990s, the Clinton administration and a number of prominent Democrats pushed through a number of agreements such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...
signed several free trade agreements during his presidency while Joe Biden
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...
did not sign any free trade agreements during his presidency and increased some tariffs on China.
During Republican Donald Trump's two terms as president, the Democratic Party has been more in favor of free trade than the Republican Party. The Democratic Party remains supportive of the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement, USMCA free trade agreement with Mexico and Canada.
Social issues
The modern Democratic Party emphasizes social equality and equal opportunity. Democrats support Voting rights in the United States, voting rights and minority rights, including LGBT rights in the United States, LGBT rights. Democratic president Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), also known as LBJ, was the 36th president of the United States, serving from 1963 to 1969. He became president after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, under whom he had served a ...
signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 () is a landmark civil rights and United States labor law, labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on Race (human categorization), race, Person of color, color, religion, sex, and nationa ...
, which outlawed racial segregation. Carmines and Stimson wrote "the Democratic Party appropriated racial liberalism and assumed federal responsibility for ending racial discrimination."
Ideological social elements in the party include cultural liberalism
Cultural liberalism is a social philosophy which expresses the social dimension of liberalism and advocates the freedom of individuals to choose whether to conform to cultural norms. In the words of Henry David Thoreau, it is often expressed ...
, civil libertarianism, and feminism. Some Democratic social policies are immigration reform, electoral reform, and women's reproductive rights.
Equal opportunity
The Democratic Party is a staunch supporter of equal opportunity for all Americans regardless of sex, age, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, creed, or national origin. The Democratic Party has broad appeal across most socioeconomic and ethnic demographics, as seen in recent exit polls. Democrats also strongly support the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, Americans with Disabilities Act to prohibit discrimination against people based on physical or mental disability. As such, the Democrats pushed as well the ADA Amendments Act of 2008, a disability rights expansion that became law.
Most Democrats support affirmative action
Affirmative action (also sometimes called reservations, alternative access, positive discrimination or positive action in various countries' laws and policies) refers to a set of policies and practices within a government or organization seeking ...
to further equal opportunity. However, in 2020 2020 California Proposition 16, 57% voters in California voted to keep their state constitution's ban on affirmative action, despite Biden 2020 United States presidential election in California, winning 63% of the vote in California in the same election.
Voting rights
The party is very supportive of improving "voting rights" as well as election accuracy and accessibility. They support extensions of voting time, including making election day a holiday. They support reforming the electoral system to eliminate gerrymandering, abolishing the United States Electoral College, electoral college, as well as passing comprehensive Campaign finance reform in the United States, campaign finance reform.
Abortion and reproductive rights
The Democratic position on abortion has changed significantly over time. During the late 1960s and early 1970s, Republicans generally favored legalized abortion more than Democrats, although significant heterogeneity could be found within both parties. During this time, opposition to abortion tended to be concentrated within the political left in the United States. Liberal Protestants and Catholics (many of whom were Democratic voters) opposed abortion, while most conservative Protestants supported legal access to abortion services.
In its national platforms from 1992 to 2004, the Democratic Party has called for abortion to be "safe, legal and rare"—namely, keeping it legal by rejecting laws that allow governmental interference in abortion decisions and reducing the number of abortions by promoting both knowledge of reproduction and contraception and incentives for adoption. When Congress voted on the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act in 2003, congressional Democrats were split, with a minority (including former Party leaders of the United States Senate, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid) supporting the ban and the majority of Democrats opposing the legislation.
According to the 2020 Democratic Party platform, "Democrats believe every woman should be able to access high-quality reproductive health care services, including safe and legal abortion."
After ''Roe v. Wade'' (1973) was overturned in ''Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization'' (2022), Democratic-controlled states and ballot initiatives were able to ensure access to abortion. The number of abortions in the United States increased after ''Dobbs'', due to the Freedom of movement under United States law, right to travel between states.
Immigration
Like the Republican Party, the Democratic Party has taken widely varying views on immigration throughout its history. Since the 1990s, the Democratic Party has been more supportive overall of immigration than the Republican Party. Many Democratic politicians have called for systematic reform of the immigration system such that residents that have Illegal immigration to the United States, come into the United States illegally have a pathway to legal citizenship. President Obama remarked in November 2013 that he felt it was "long past time to fix our broken immigration system," particularly to allow "incredibly bright young people" that came over as students to become full citizens. In 2013, Democrats in the Senate passed Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act of 2013, S. 744, which would reform immigration policy to allow citizenship for illegal immigrants in the United States. The law failed to pass in the House and was never re-introduced after the 113th Congress.
Opposition to immigration has increased in the 2020s, with a majority of Democrats supporting increasing border security. In the 2024 United States presidential election, 2024 presidential election, Trump increased his vote share in counties along the Mexico–United States border, including in List of majority-Hispanic or Latino counties in the United States, majority-Hispanic counties.
LGBT rights
The Democratic position on LGBT rights in the United States, LGBT rights has changed significantly over time. Before the 2000s, like the Republicans, the Democratic Party often took positions hostile to LGBT rights. As of the 2020s, both voters and elected representatives within the Democratic Party are overwhelmingly supportive of LGBT rights.
Support for same-sex marriage has steadily increased among the general public, including voters in both major parties, since the start of the 21st century. An April 2009 ABC News/''Washington Post'' public opinion poll put support among Democrats at 62%. A 2006 Pew Research Center poll of Democrats found that 55% supported gays adopting children with 40% opposed while 70% support Sexual orientation and military service, gays in the military, with only 23% opposed. Gallup polling from May 2009 stated that 82% of Democrats support open enlistment. A 2023 Gallup public opinion poll found 84% of Democrats support same-sex marriage, compared to 71% support by the general public and 49% support by Republicans.
The 2004 Democratic National Platform stated that marriage should be defined at the state level and it repudiated the Federal Marriage Amendment.[ ] John Kerry, the Democratic presidential nominee in 2004, did not support same-sex marriage in John Kerry 2004 presidential campaign, his campaign. While not stating support of same-sex marriage, the 2008 platform called for repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, which banned federal recognition of same-sex marriage and removed the need for interstate recognition, supported antidiscrimination laws and the extension of hate crime laws to LGBT people and opposed "don't ask, don't tell". The 2012 platform included support for same-sex marriage and for the repeal of DOMA.
On May 9, 2012, Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...
became the first sitting president to say he supports same-sex marriage. Previously, he had opposed restrictions on same-sex marriage such as the Defense of Marriage Act, which he promised to repeal, California's Prop 8, and a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage (which he opposed saying that "decisions about marriage should be left to the states as they always have been"), but also stated that he personally believed marriage to be between a man and a woman and that he favored civil unions that would "give same-sex couples equal legal rights and privileges as married couples". Earlier, when running for the Illinois Senate in 1996 he said, "I favor legalizing same-sex marriages, and would fight efforts to prohibit such marriages". Former presidents Bill Clinton
William Jefferson Clinton (né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician and lawyer who was the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, ...
and Jimmy Carter
James Earl Carter Jr. (October 1, 1924December 29, 2024) was an American politician and humanitarian who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party ...
along with former Democratic presidential nominees Al Gore
Albert Arnold Gore Jr. (born March 31, 1948) is an American former politician, businessman, and environmentalist who served as the 45th vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton. He previously served as ...
and Michael Dukakis
Michael Stanley Dukakis ( ; born November 3, 1933) is an American politician and lawyer who served as governor of Massachusetts from 1975 to 1979 and from 1983 to 1991. He is the longest-serving governor in Massachusetts history and only the s ...
support same-sex marriage. President Joe Biden
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...
has supported same-sex marriage since 2012, when he became the highest-ranking government official to support it. In 2022, Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act; the law repealed the Defense of Marriage Act, which Biden had voted for during his Senate tenure.
Status of Puerto Rico and D.C.
The 2016 Democratic Party platform declares, regarding the status of Puerto Rico: "We are committed to addressing the extraordinary challenges faced by our fellow citizens in Puerto Rico. Many stem from the fundamental question of Puerto Rico's political status. Democrats believe that the people of Puerto Rico should determine their ultimate political status from permanent options that do not conflict with the Constitution, laws, and policies of the United States. Democrats are committed to promoting economic opportunity and good-paying jobs for the hardworking people of Puerto Rico. We also believe that Puerto Ricans must be treated equally by Medicare, Medicaid, and other programs that benefit families. Puerto Ricans should be able to vote for the people who make their laws, just as they should be treated equally. All American citizens, no matter where they reside, should have the right to vote for the president of the United States. Finally, we believe that federal officials must respect Puerto Rico's local self-government as laws are implemented and Puerto Rico's budget and debt are restructured so that it can get on a path towards stability and prosperity".
Also, it declares that regarding the status of the District of Columbia: "Restoring our democracy also means finally passing statehood for the District of Columbia, so that the American citizens who reside in the nation's capital have full and equal congressional rights as well as the right to have the laws and budget of their local government respected without Congressional interference."
Legal issues
Gun control
With a stated goal of reducing crime and homicide, the Democratic Party has introduced various Gun politics in the United States, gun control measures, most notably the Gun Control Act of 1968, the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, Brady Bill of 1993 and the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act (1994). In its national platform for 2008, the only statement explicitly favoring gun control was a plan calling for renewal of the 1994 Federal Assault Weapons Ban, Assault Weapons Ban. In 2022, Democratic president Joe Biden
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...
signed the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, which among other things expanded background checks and provided incentives for states to pass red flag laws.
The Democratic Party does not oppose gun ownership. According to a 2023 Pew Research Center poll, 20% of Democrats owned firearms, compared to 32% of the general public and 45% of Republicans.
Death penalty
The Democratic Party's 2020 platform states its opposition to the death penalty. Although most Democrats in Congress have never seriously moved to overturn the rarely used Capital punishment by the United States federal government, federal death penalty, both Russ Feingold and Dennis Kucinich have introduced such bills with little success. Democrats have led efforts to overturn state death penalty laws, and prevent the reinstatement of the death penalty in those states which prohibit it, including Capital punishment in Massachusetts, Massachusetts, Capital punishment in New York (state), New York, and Capital punishment in Delaware, Delaware. During the Clinton administration
Bill Clinton's tenure as the 42nd president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 1993, and ended on January 20, 2001. Clinton, a Democrat from Arkansas, took office following his victory over Republican in ...
, Democrats led the expansion of the federal death penalty. These efforts resulted in the passage of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, signed into law by Bill Clinton, President Clinton, which heavily limited appeals in death penalty cases.
In 1972, the Democratic Party platform called for the abolition of capital punishment.
During his Illinois Senate career of Barack Obama, Illinois Senate career, former President Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...
successfully introduced legislation intended to reduce the likelihood of Miscarriage of justice, wrongful convictions in capital cases, requiring videotaping of confessions. When Barack Obama 2008 presidential campaign, campaigning for the presidency, Obama stated that he supports the limited use of the death penalty, including for people who have been convicted of raping a minor under the age of 12, having opposed the Supreme Court of the United States, Supreme Court's ruling in ''Kennedy v. Louisiana'' that the death penalty was unconstitutional in which the victim of a crime was not killed. Obama has stated that he thinks the "death penalty does little to deter crime" and that it is used too frequently and too inconsistently. In June 2016, the Democratic Platform Drafting Committee unanimously adopted an amendment to abolish the death penalty.
The 2024 platform is the first since the 2004 Democratic National Convention, 2004 platform, that doesn't mention the death penalty, and the first since 2016 not to call for abolition. However, on December 23, 2024, President Biden commuted the sentences of 37 out of 40 List of death row inmates in the United States#Federal, federal death row inmates to life in prison without parole.
Torture
Many Democrats are opposed to the Torture and the United States, use of torture against individuals apprehended and held prisoner by the United States armed forces, United States military, and hold that categorizing such prisoners as unlawful combatants does not release the United States from its obligations under the Geneva Conventions. Democrats contend that torture is inhumane, damages the United States' moral standing in the world, and produces questionable results. Democrats are largely against waterboarding.
Torture became a divisive issue in the party after Barack Obama was elected president.
Privacy
The Democratic Party believes that individuals should have a privacy law, right to privacy. For example, many Democrats have opposed the NSA warrantless surveillance (2001–07), NSA warrantless surveillance of American citizens.
Some Democratic officeholders have championed consumer protection laws that limit the sharing of consumer data between corporations. Democrats have opposed Sodomy laws in the United States, sodomy laws since the 1972 platform which stated that "Americans should be free to make their own choice of life-styles and private habits without being subject to discrimination or prosecution", and believe that government should not regulate consensual noncommercial sexual conduct among adults as a matter of personal privacy.
Foreign policy issues
The foreign policy of the voters of the two major parties has largely overlapped since the 1990s. A Gallup poll in early 2013 showed broad agreement on the top issues, albeit with some divergence regarding human rights and international cooperation through agencies such as the United Nations.
In June 2014, the Quinnipiac Poll asked Americans which foreign policy they preferred:
Democrats chose A over B by 65% to 32%; Republicans chose A over B by 56% to 39%; and independents chose A over B by 67% to 29%.
Iran sanctions
The Democratic Party has been critical of Iran's nuclear weapon program and supported economic sanctions against the Iranian government. In 2013, the Democratic-led administration worked to reach a diplomatic agreement with the government of Iran to halt the Iranian nuclear weapon program in exchange for Sanctions against Iran, international economic sanction relief. , negotiations had been successful and the party called for more cooperation with Iran in the future. In 2015, the Obama administration agreed to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which provides sanction relief in exchange for international oversight of the Iranian nuclear program. In February 2019, the Democratic National Committee passed a resolution calling on the United States to re-enter the JCPOA, which President Trump withdrew from in 2018.
Invasion of Afghanistan
Democrats in the House of Representatives and in the Senate near-unanimously voted for the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Terrorists against "those responsible for the September 11 attacks, recent attacks launched against the United States" in Afghanistan in 2001, supporting the NATO coalition Operation Enduring Freedom, invasion of the nation. Most elected Democrats continued to support the War in Afghanistan (2001–present), Afghanistan conflict during George W. Bush's presidency.["John McCain & Barack Obama urge Afghanistan surge"](_blank)
. ''New York Daily News''. July 15, 2008. Retrieved August 23, 2008. During the 2008 United States presidential election, 2008 Presidential Election, then-candidate Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...
called for a "surge" of troops into Afghanistan. After winning the presidency, Obama followed through, sending additional troops to Afghanistan. Troop levels were 94,000 in December 2011 and kept falling, with a target of 68,000 by fall 2012.
Support for the war among the American people diminished over time. Many Democrats changed their opinion over the course of the war, coming to oppose continuation of the conflict. In July 2008, Gallup poll, Gallup found that 41% of Democrats called the invasion a "mistake" while a 55% majority disagreed.["Afghan War Edges Out Iraq as Most Important for U.S."](_blank)
by Frank Newport. Gallup poll, Gallup. July 30, 2008. Retrieved August 24, 2009. A CNN survey in August 2009 stated that a majority of Democrats opposed the war. CNN polling director Keating Holland said: "Nearly two thirds of Republicans support the war in Afghanistan. Three quarters of Democrats oppose the war".[Most Americans oppose Afghanistan war: poll](_blank)
. ''The Australian''. August 7, 2009. Retrieved August 24, 2009.
During the 2020 United States presidential election, 2020 Presidential Election, then-candidate Joe Biden
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...
promised to "end the forever wars in Afghanistan and the Middle East." Biden went on to win the election, and in April 2021, he announced he would withdraw all US troops from Afghanistan by September 11 of that year. The last troops left in August, bringing America's 20-year-long military campaign in the country to a close. According to a 2023 AP-NORC poll, a majority of Democrats believed that the War in Afghanistan was not worth it.
Israel
Democrats have historically been a stronger supporter of Israel than Republicans. During the 1940s, the party advocated for the cause of an independent Jewish state over the objections of many Conservatism in the United States, conservatives in the Old Right (United States), Old Right, who strongly opposed it. In 1948, Democratic President Harry S. Truman, Harry Truman became the first world leader to recognize an independent state of Israel.
The 2020 Democratic Party platform acknowledges a "commitment to Israel's security, its qualitative military edge, its right to defend itself, and the 2016 Memorandum of Understanding is ironclad" and that "we oppose any effort to unfairly single out and delegitimize Israel, including at the United Nations or through the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Movement". During the Gaza war, the party requested a large-scale military aid package to Israel. Biden also announced United States support for Israel in the Gaza war, military support for Israel, condemned the actions of Hamas and other Palestinian militants as terrorism, and ordered the US military to build a port to facilitate the arrival of Humanitarian aid during the Gaza war, humanitarian aid to Palestinian civilians in Gaza. However, parts of the Democratic base also became more skeptical of the Israel government.
The number of Democrats (and Americans in general) who oppose sending arms to Israel has grown month by month as Gaza war, Israel's war on Gaza continues. Experts say support for Israel could have a negative impact on Democrats in several key states, including Michigan and Pennsylvania, in the 2024 presidential election.
Late in 2024, twenty Democrats requested support for US legislation that would ban the arms trade with countries that hinder humanitarian aid.
According to Pew research conducted in March 2025, 69% of Democrats now have an unfavorable view of Israel, compared to 53% in 2022, before the Gaza war.
Europe, Russia, and Ukraine
The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine was politically and economically opposed by the Biden Administration, who promptly began an increased arming of Ukraine.["Here are the 11 GOP senators who voted against the Ukraine aid bill,"](_blank)
May 19, 2022, ''The Hill (magazine)'' retrieved July 4, 2023["A Loud Republican Minority Opposes More Ukraine Military Aid,"](_blank)
May 19, 2023, ''New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' retrieved July 4, 2023 In October 2023, the Biden administration requested an additional $61.4 billion in aid for Ukraine for the year ahead, but delays in the passage of further aid by the Republican-controlled United States House of Representatives, House of Representatives inhibited progress, with the additional $61 billion in aid to Ukraine added in April 2024.
Demographics
In the 2024 United States presidential election, 2024 presidential election, the party performed best among voters who were Affluence in the United States, upper income, lived in Urban–rural political divide, urban areas, educational attainment in the United States, college graduates, identified as Atheism, Atheist, Agnosticism, Agnostic, or American Jews, Jewish; African Americans
African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa ...
, LGBT, LGBT+, and Marital status, unmarried. In particular, Kamala Harris' two strongest demographic groups in the 2024 presidential election were African Americans (86-13%) and LGBT voters (86-12%).
Support for the civil rights movement in the 1960s by Democratic presidents John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), also known as JFK, was the 35th president of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. He was the first Roman Catholic and youngest person elected p ...
and Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), also known as LBJ, was the 36th president of the United States, serving from 1963 to 1969. He became president after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, under whom he had served a ...
helped increase the Democrats' support within the African American community. African Americans have consistently voted between 85% and 95% Democratic since the 1960s, making African Americans one of the largest of the party's constituencies.
According to the Pew Research Center, 78.4% of Democrats in the 116th United States Congress were Christian. However, the vast majority of white evangelical and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Latter-day Saint Christians favor the Republican Party. The party also receives strong support from Irreligion, non-religious voters.
Age
Younger Americans have tended to vote mainly for Democratic candidates in recent years, particularly those under the age of 30.
In the 2024 presidential election, Harris won voters aged 18–29 (54-43%) and 30–39 (51-45%), tied among those aged 40–49 (49-49%), lost those aged 50–64 (43–56%), and narrowly lost those aged 65 and older (49–50%). The median voter is in their 50s.
One of the main reasons that 18–29 year old voters strongly support Democrats is that they are much less likely to be married. Harris tied with White voters aged 18–29 (49-49%) and won White women aged 18–29 (54-44%).
Race
Referring to the state map of the White vote, Kamala Harris in 2024 United States presidential election, 2024 won every state where Joe Biden won the White vote in 2020 United States presidential election, 2020. Republican Donald Trump won every state where Joe Biden lost the White vote except for Virginia. Virginia is both 20% African American and its White voters are much less Republican than those of other Southern states, because Northern Virginia in the Washington metropolitan area is a Democratic stronghold.
Referring to the county map of the White vote, Democrats do win White voters in most of New England and the West Coast of the United States, West Coast. Democrats also do well in regions with high Nordic and Scandinavian Americans, Nordic and Scandinavian ancestry. For example, this keeps White voters in Minnesota and Wisconsin much less Republican than in other Midwestern states.
Democrats are also relatively competitive among or win White voters in parts of the Northeastern United States, Northeast, Midwestern United States, Midwest, and Southwestern United States, Southwest. Democrats do particularly poorly among White Southerners, as racial polarization is extremely high in the Southern United States.
In the 2024 presidential election, African Americans supported Kamala Harris 86-13%, while White Southerners supported Donald Trump 67-32%. Even in many urban counties in the Southern United States, Democrats do not win a majority of White voters. Trump won both White Southerners with college degrees (57-41%) and without college degrees (75-24%).
* In the swing states of Georgia and North Carolina, which Harris lost by 2.2% and 3.2%, Whites supported Trump 71-28% and 62-37%. Trump won White voters with college degrees in Georgia 57-43%, and lost White voters with college degrees in North Carolina 47–51%.
*White evangelicals supported Trump in Georgia (91-9%) and North Carolina (87-12%), on par with African American support for Harris in Georgia (88-11%) and North Carolina (86-12%).
New Mexico is Hispanics and Latinos in New Mexico, half-Hispanic (49.3%), as the most heavily-Hispanic state in the country. Of the 19 states and the District of Columbia won by Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election, all except New Mexico had above-average educational attainment. New Mexico also had the lowest List of states and territories of the United States by population density, population density and the highest List of U.S. states and territories by poverty rate, poverty rate of any state carried by Harris.
Gender and sexual minorities
Since 1980, a "gender gap" has seen stronger support for the Democratic Party among women than among men. Unmarried and divorced women are more likely to vote for Democrats.["Unmarried Women in the 2004 Presidential Election"]
(PDF). Report by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research, January 2005. p. 3: "The marriage gap is one of the most important cleavages in electoral politics. Unmarried women voted for Kerry by a 25-point margin (62 to 37 percent), while married women voted for President Bush by an 11-point margin (55 percent to 44 percent). Indeed, the 25-point margin Kerry posted among unmarried women represented one of the high water marks for the Senator among all demographic groups." Although women supported Obama over Mitt Romney by a margin of 55–44% in 2012, Romney prevailed amongst married women, 53–46%. Obama won unmarried women 67–31%. According to a December 2019 study, "White women are the only group of female voters who support Republican Party candidates for president. They have done so by a majority in all but 2 of the last 18 elections".
In the 2024 presidential election, LGBT voters supported Harris 86-12%, on par with African Americans. Harris lost married men (38–60%) and married women (47–52%), tied among unmarried men (48-48%), and won unmarried women (61-38%).
White women with college degrees do support Democrats somewhat strongly, with Harris winning them 58-41%, likely the best ever modern performance with this demographic. They were one of the few demographic groups that shifted towards Democrats from 2020 to 2024.
List of U.S. states and territories by fertility rate, Total fertility rate is strongly negatively correlated with support for the Democratic Party. Specifically, as total fertility increased in states, Democratic vote share decreased.
Region
Geographically, the party is strongest in the Northeastern United States, parts of the Great Lakes region and Southwestern United States, and the West Coast of the United States, West Coast. The party is also very strong in List of United States cities by population, major cities, regardless of region.
The Democratic Party gradually lost its power in the Southern United States
The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, Dixieland, or simply the South) is List of regions of the United States, census regions defined by the United States Cens ...
since 1964 United States presidential election, 1964. Although Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 until Resignation of Richard Nixon, his resignation in 1974. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican ...
carried 49 states in 1972 United States presidential election, 1972, including every Southern state, the Republican Party remained quite weak at the local and state levels across the entire South for decades. Republicans first won a majority of U.S. House seats in the South in the 1994 United States elections, 1994 "Republican Revolution", and only began to dominate the South after the 2010 United States elections, 2010 elections. Since the 2010s, White Southerners are the Republican Party's strongest racial demographic, in some Deep South states voting nearly as Republican as African Americans vote Democratic. This is partially attributable to religiosity, with White evangelical Christianity, evangelical Christians in the Bible Belt, which covers most of the South, being the Republican Party's strongest religious demographic.
The Democratic Party is particularly strong in the West Coast and Northeastern United States. In particular, the Democratic Party receives its strongest support from White voters in these two regions. This is attributable to the two regions having the highest educational attainment in the country and being part of the "Unchurched Belt," with the lowest rates of religiosity in the country.
The Democratic Party's support in the Midwestern United States, Midwest and Southwestern United States, Southwest are more mixed, with varying levels of support from White voters in both regions. In the Midwest, the Democratic Party receives varying levels of support, with some states safely Democratic, some swing states, and some safely Republican. In the Southwest, the Democratic Party also relies on Hispanic and Latino Americans, Hispanic voters.
The Democratic Party is particularly weak in the Great Plains and some Mountain states. In particular, the states of Idaho, Utah, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma have not voted for the Democratic Party since the 1964 United States presidential election, 1964 presidential election. Montana has not voted for the Democratic Party since the 1992 United States presidential election, 1992 presidential election.[Sullivan, Robert David]
‘How the Red and Blue Map Evolved Over the Past Century’
''America Magazine'' in ''The National Catholic Review''; June 29, 2016
White voters have considerable regional variations. In 2024 presidential election, Kamala Harris lost Southern White voters 32–67% and Midwestern White voters 40–59%. Harris tied among White voters in the Northeastern United States 49-49%, and won White voters in the Western United States 52-45%. Harris lost White voters in the country as a whole to Trump 42–57%.
Population density
The Democratic Party's support is strongly positively correlated with increased population density, consistent with the urban-rural divide observed globally. Notably, in the 2024 United States presidential election, 2024 presidential election, the swings against Kamala Harris were inversely correlated to population density, shrinking the urban-rural divide slightly. Harris still received higher support as population density increased. But relative to 2020, urban areas had the largest swings against Harris, suburban areas had lesser swings against Harris, and rural areas had the smallest swings against Harris.
Specifically, Harris won voters in urban areas (60-38%), narrowly lost voters in suburban areas (47–51%), and lost voters in rural areas (34–64%). The urban-rural divide holds after controlling for race.
*Harris won White voters in urban areas (53-45%), lost them in suburban areas (41–57%), and lost them in rural areas (31–68%).
*Harris won Hispanic voters in urban areas (57-39%) and suburban areas (51-48%), and lost them in rural areas (33–66%).
*Harris won African American voters in urban areas (89-10%), suburban areas (86-12%), and rural areas (71-27%).
The only state of the ten least densely populated that Harris won was New Mexico, which is half-Hispanic (49.3%).
In the Southern United States
The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, Dixieland, or simply the South) is List of regions of the United States, census regions defined by the United States Cens ...
, racial polarization is often stronger than the urban-rural divide. In particular, Democrats lose White voters in many Southern urban areas, while doing extremely well in rural List of majority-Black counties in the United States, majority-Black counties.
Income and wealth
Until the 2016 victory of Republican Donald Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...
, lower income was strongly correlated to voting for the Democratic Party among the general electorate. However, in all three of Trump's elections in 2016, 2020, and 2024, the previous correlation between lower incomes and voting for the Democratic Party was eliminated. For White voters, instead higher educational attainment was strongly correlated with higher support for the Democratic Party.
In the 2024 presidential election, Democratic nominee Kamala Harris did better among higher-income voters than lower-income voters for the first time ever in modern American political history. High-income voters, including high-income White voters and White men with college degrees, are no longer Republican demographic strongholds and voted in line with the national popular vote in 2024. Harris only narrowly lost White voters making $100,000 to $199,999 (49–50%), over $200,000 (48–51%), and White men with college degrees (48–50%), all on par with Harris losing the popular vote 48–50%. White men with college degrees are the highest-income demographic group.
Nate Silver argues that the urban-rural political divide, urban-rural divide, educational polarization, and racial polarization have rendered income irrelevant to voters in the Trump era.
African Americans
African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa ...
continue to be the lowest-income demographic in the United States. According to 2024 exit polls, 45% of Black voters made less than $50,000 a year, compared to 27% of the electorate. Harris still won most of the List of lowest-income counties in the United States, lowest-income counties, which are mainly majority-Black counties in the Black Belt in the American South, Southern Black Belt.
Higher educational attainment is strongly correlated to higher income and wealth, and the 2021-2023 inflation surge resulted in lower-income voters losing purchasing power while higher-income voters gained from financial asset, asset prices increasing due to inflation, including stocks and real estate.
*Among White voters in 2024, income was negatively correlated with support for Kamala Harris. Specifically, Harris lost White voters making less than $30,000 (34–63%), those making between $30,000 to $49,999 (37–62%), and those making $50,000 to $99,999 (42–56%). Harris only narrowly lost White voters making $100,000 to $199,999 (49–50%) and those making more than $200,000 (48–51%).
*Among the electorate as a whole, Harris won those making less than $30,000 (50–46%), lost those making between $30,000 and $99,999 (46–52%), won those making between $100,000 and $199,999 (51–48%), and won those making over $200,000 (52–46%). Harris' strongest income demographic were voters making over $200,000 a year.
After controlling for education, there was little difference in White voter support for Harris by annual income. Note than 54% of White voters did not have degrees, and 46% of White voters did have college degrees.
*Harris lost White voters without college degrees making less than $50,000 (30–68%), making between $50,000 and $99,999 (32–67%), and making over $100,000 (33–66%). Among White voters without college degrees, 36% made less than $50,000, 35% made between $50,000 and $99,999, and 30% over $100,000.
*Harris won White voters with college degrees making less than $50,000 (54–44%), making between $50,000 and $99,999 (54–45%), and making over $100,000 (53–46%). Among White voters with college degrees, 11% made less than $50,000, 27% made between $50,000 and $99,999, and 62% made over $100,000.
According to a 2022 Gallup poll, roughly equal proportions of Democrats (64-35%) and Republicans (66-34%) had money invested in the stock market.
Education
In the 2020 presidential election, college-educated White voters in all 50 states voted more Democratic than non-college White voters, as displayed in the two maps. As of 2022, over 90% of American adults over the age of 25 have completed high school. However, only 35% have a Bachelor's degree and 17% have a graduate degree. Higher educational attainment among White voters corresponds to increased ideological support for the Democratic Party.
Educational attainment is not the only factor that affects ideology among White voters. After controlling for education, there still remain huge variations by state and region. Educational polarization is weaker than racial polarization in the South.
*Southern White voters with college degrees remain strongly Republican, with Harris losing them 41–57% in the 2024 presidential election. Harris won White voters with college degrees in the Midwestern United States 50-48%, the Northeastern United States 61-38%, and in the Western United States 67-30%. Harris won White voters with college degrees as a whole 53-45%.
*Harris lost White voters without college degrees 24–75% in the Southern United States, 32–67% in the Midwestern United States, 37–61% in the Northeastern United States, and 42–56% in the Western United States. Harris lost White voters without college degrees as a whole 32–66%.
Educational polarization has benefitted Democrats in some well-educated Southern states, because it has not changed African American support for Democrats. Democrats are competitive in Georgia and North Carolina because there is much more room for Democrats to grow among White Southerners with college degrees than ground for Democrats to fall among White Southerners without college degrees. This also keeps Virginia reliably Democratic, despite its White voters voting Republican.
In the 2024 presidential election, among White voters educational attainment was strongly positively correlated with support for Kamala Harris. Specifically, as educational attainment increased among White voters, so did support for Harris. It wasn't only about having a college degree or not, but rather support for Harris continuously increased as educational attainment increased.
*In particular, Harris lost White voters with high school or less 25–73%, an Associate degree 31–67%, and some college 38–61%. Harris tied with Trump among White voters with a Bachelor's degree 49-49%, and won White voters with a Postgraduate education, graduate degree 58-40%.
Educational polarization is stronger than gender and marital status among White voters, but weaker than racial polarization in the South.
*Harris won White women with college degrees (58-41%) and lost White men with college degrees (48–50%) by the same as the popular vote.
*Harris lost White women without college degrees (35–63%) and White men without college degrees (29–69%).
According to a Gallup poll in November 2024, unionization rates were positively correlated to increased educational attainment and higher income. In particular, 15% of those with graduate degrees, 8% with bachelor's degrees, 9% with some college, and 5% with high school or less were unionized. Also, 11% of those with household incomes of $100,000 or more, 7% of those with $40,000 to $99,999, and 3% with less than $40,000 were unionized. Also only 6% of those in the private sector were unionized, compared to 28% of government employees.
Many Democrats without college degrees differ from liberals in their more socially moderate views, and are more likely to belong to an ethnic minority. White voters with college degrees are more likely to live in urban areas.
*There was no difference in support for Harris from African Americans based on education, with Harris winning African Americans with and without a college degree 86-13%.
*There was a modest difference in support for Harris among Hispanic voters with a college degree (54-42%) and without a college degree (51-48%). This was far less than the differences among Hispanic voters in urban (57-39%), suburban (51-48%), and rural areas (33–66%).
Factions
Upon foundation, the Democratic Party supported agrarianism
Agrarianism is a social philosophy, social and political philosophy that advocates for rural development, a Rural area, rural agricultural lifestyle, family farming, widespread property ownership, and political decentralization. Those who adhere ...
and the Jacksonian democracy
Jacksonian democracy, also known as Jacksonianism, was a 19th-century political ideology in the United States that restructured a number of federal institutions. Originating with the seventh U.S. president, Andrew Jackson and his supporters, i ...
movement of President Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before Presidency of Andrew Jackson, his presidency, he rose to fame as a general in the U.S. Army and served in both houses ...
, representing farmers and rural interests and traditional Jeffersonian democracy, Jeffersonian democrats. Since the 1890s, especially in northern states, the party began to favor more liberal positions (the term "liberal" in this sense describes Modern liberalism in the United States, modern liberalism, rather than classical liberalism or economic liberalism). Historically, the party has represented farmers, laborers, and religious and ethnic minorities as it has opposed unregulated business and finance and favored progressive income taxes.
In the 1930s, the party began advocating Social programs in the United States, social programs targeted at the poor. Before the New Deal
The New Deal was a series of wide-reaching economic, social, and political reforms enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1938, in response to the Great Depression in the United States, Great Depressi ...
, the party had a Fiscal conservatism, fiscally conservative, Economic liberalism, pro-business wing, typified by Grover Cleveland
Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837June 24, 1908) was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States, serving from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. He was the first U.S. president to serve nonconsecutive terms and the first Hist ...
and Al Smith. The party was Solid South, dominant in the Southern United States until President Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), also known as LBJ, was the 36th president of the United States, serving from 1963 to 1969. He became president after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, under whom he had served a ...
signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 () is a landmark civil rights and United States labor law, labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on Race (human categorization), race, Person of color, color, religion, sex, and nationa ...
. In foreign policy, internationalism (politics), internationalism (including interventionism (politics), interventionism) was a dominant theme from 1913 to the mid-1960s. The major influences for liberalism were labor unions (which peaked in the 1936–1952 era) and African Americans. Environmentalism has been a major component since the 1970s.
Even after the New Deal, until the 2010s, the party still had conservative coalition, a fiscally conservative faction, such as John Nance Garner and Howard W. Smith. The party's Southern Democrats, Southern conservative wing began shrinking after President Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), also known as LBJ, was the 36th president of the United States, serving from 1963 to 1969. He became president after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, under whom he had served a ...
supported the Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 () is a landmark civil rights and United States labor law, labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on Race (human categorization), race, Person of color, color, religion, sex, and nationa ...
, and largely died out in the 2010s, as the Republican Party built up its Southern base. The party still receives support from African Americans and urban areas in the Southern United States.
The 21st century Democratic Party is predominantly a coalition of centrists, liberals, and progressives, with significant overlap between the three groups. In 2019, the Pew Research Center found that among Democratic and Democratic-leaning registered voters, 47% identify as liberal or very liberal, 38% identify as moderate, and 14% identify as conservative or very conservative. Political scientists characterize the Democratic Party as less ideologically cohesive than the Republican Party due to the broader diversity of coalitions that compose the Democratic Party.
The party has lost significant ground with voters without college degrees in the 21st century, in line with trends across the developed world. The realignment unfolded gradually, first with White voters in the Southern United States, South and Midwestern United States, Midwest, and later with voters as a whole without college degrees, except for African Americans
African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa ...
.
Democrats have consistently won voters with graduate degrees since the 1990s, including a majority of White voters with graduate degrees. Since the 2010s, the party's main demographic gains have been among White voters with college degrees, which were previously a Republican-leaning group until 2016. The party still receives extremely strong support from African Americans
African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa ...
, but has lost ground among other racial minorities, including Hispanic and Latino Americans, Hispanics, Native Americans in the United States, Native Americans, and Asian Americans.
Liberals
Modern liberals are a large portion of the Democratic base. According to 2018 exit polls, liberals constituted 27% of the electorate, and 91% of American liberals favored the candidate of the Democratic Party. White-collar worker, White-collar college-educated professionals were mostly Republican until the 1950s, but they had become a vital component of the Democratic Party by the early 2000s.
According to a 2025 Gallup (company), Gallup poll, 37% of American voters identify as "conservative" or "very conservative", 34% as "moderate", and 25% as "liberal" or "very liberal". For Democrats, 9% identified as conservative, 34% as moderate, and 55% as liberal.
A large majority of liberals favor moving toward universal health care. A majority also favor diplomacy over war, military action; stem cell, stem cell research, same-sex marriage in the United States, same-sex marriage, stricter Gun politics in the United States, gun control, environmental protection laws, as well as the preservation of pro-choice, abortion rights. Immigration and cultural diversity are deemed positive as liberals favor cultural pluralism, a system in which immigrants retain their native culture in addition to adopting their new culture. Most liberals oppose increased military spending and the mixing of church and state. As of 2020, the three most significant labor groupings in the Democratic coalition were the AFL–CIO and Change to Win Federation, Change to Win National trade union center, labor federations as well as the National Education Association, a large, unaffiliated teachers' union. Important issues for labor unions include supporting unionized manufacturing jobs, raising the minimum wage in the United States, minimum wage, and promoting broad social programs such as Social Security (United States), Social Security and Medicare.
This ideological group is strongly correlated with high educational attainment. According to the Pew Research Center, 49% were college graduates, the highest figure of any typographical group. It was also the fastest growing typological group since the late 1990s to the present. Liberals include most of the academia and large portions of the professional class.
Moderates
Moderate Democrats, or New Democrats (United States), New Democrats, are an ideologically Centrism, centrist faction within the Democratic Party that emerged after the victory of Republican Party (United States), Republican George H. W. Bush in the 1988 United States presidential election, 1988 presidential election. Running as a New Democrat, Bill Clinton won the 1992 United States presidential election, 1992 and 1996 United States presidential election, 1996 presidential elections. They are an economically Economic liberalism, liberal and "Third Way
The Third Way is a predominantly centrist political position that attempts to reconcile centre-right and centre-left politics by advocating a varying synthesis of Right-wing economics, right-wing economic and Left-wing politics, left-wing so ...
" faction that dominated the party for around 20 years, until the beginning of Presidency of Barack Obama, Obama's presidency. They are represented by organizations such as the New Democrat Network and the New Democrat Coalition.
The Blue Dog Coalition was formed during the 104th United States Congress, 104th Congress to give members from the Democratic Party representing conservative-leaning districts a unified voice after the Democrats' loss of Congress in the 1994 United States House of Representatives elections, 1994 Republican Revolution. However, in the late 2010s and early 2020s, the Coalition's focus shifted towards ideological centrism
Centrism is the range of political ideologies that exist between left-wing politics and right-wing politics on the left–right political spectrum. It is associated with moderate politics, including people who strongly support moderate policie ...
. One of the most influential centrist groups was the Democratic Leadership Council
The Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) was a non-profit 501(c)(4) corporation that was active from 1985 to 2011. Founded and directed by Al From, it argued that the United States Democratic Party should shift away from the leftward turn it had ...
(DLC), a nonprofit organization that advocated centrist positions for the party. The DLC disbanded in 2011.
Some Democratic elected officials have self-declared as being centrists, including former President Bill Clinton, former Vice President Al Gore
Albert Arnold Gore Jr. (born March 31, 1948) is an American former politician, businessman, and environmentalist who served as the 45th vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton. He previously served as ...
, Senator Mark Warner, Kansas governor Laura Kelly, former Senator Jim Webb, and President Joe Biden
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...
. The New Democrat Network supports socially liberal and fiscally moderate Democratic politicians and is associated with the congressional New Democrat Coalition in the House. Annie Kuster is the chair of the coalition, and former senator and President Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...
was self-described as a New Democrat. In the 21st century, some former Republican moderates have switched to the Democratic Party.
Progressives
Progressives are the most left-leaning faction in the party and support strong business regulations, Social programs in the United States, social programs, and workers' rights. In 2014, progressive Senator Elizabeth Warren set out "Eleven Commandments of Progressivism": tougher regulation on corporations; affordable education; scientific investment and environmentalism; net neutrality; increased wages; equal pay for women; collective bargaining rights; defending social programs; same-sex marriage in the United States, same-sex marriage; Immigration reform in the US, immigration reform; and unabridged access to reproductive healthcare. The Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) is a caucus of progressive Democrats chaired by Pramila Jayapal of Washington (state), Washington. Its members have included Representatives Dennis Kucinich of Ohio, John Conyers of Michigan, Jim McDermott of Washington (state), Washington, Barbara Lee of California, and Senator Paul Wellstone of Minnesota. Senators Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin, Mazie Hirono of Hawaii, and Ed Markey of Massachusetts were members of the caucus when in the House of Representatives. As of 2024, the CPC is the second-largest ideological caucus in the House Democratic Caucus by voting members, behind the New Democrat Coalition. Senator Bernie Sanders has often been viewed as a leader of the progressive movement; he ran presidential campaigns in 2016 Democratic Party presidential primaries, 2016 and 2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries, 2020. Other members of the progressive faction include the Squad (U.S. Congress), Squad.
Democratic presidents
, there have been a total of 16 Democratic presidents.
Recent electoral history
In congressional elections: 1950–present
In presidential elections: 1828–present
See also
* Democratic Party (United States) organizations
* List of political parties in the United States
* List of United States Democratic Party presidential candidates
* List of United States Democratic Party presidential tickets
* Political party strength in U.S. states
* Politics of the United States
* List of major liberal parties considered left
Notes
References
Further reading
* ''The Almanac of American Politics 2022'' (2022) details on members of Congress, and the governors: their records and election results; also state and district politics; revised every two years since 1975. see The Almanac of American Politics
* ''American National Biography'' (20 volumes, 1999) covers all politicians no longer alive; online at many academic libraries and a
Wikipedia Library
* Andelic, Patrick. ''Donkey Work: Congressional Democrats in Conservative America, 1974–1994'' (2019
online
* Baker, Jean H. ''Affairs of party: The political culture of northern Democrats in the mid-nineteenth century'' (Fordham UP, 1998).
* Bass Jr, Harold F. ''Historical dictionary of United States political parties'' (Scarecrow Press, 2009).
*
* Burner, David. ''The Politics of Provincialism: The Democratic Party in Transition, 1918–1932'' (Knopf, 1968).
* Congressional Quarterly. ''National Party Conventions, 1831–2000'' (2001).
* Congressional Quarterly. ''Presidential Elections 1789–2008'' (10th edition, 2009)
* Craig, Douglas. "Newton D. Baker and the Democratic Malaise, 1920–1937." ''Australasian Journal of American Studies'' (2006): 49–64
in JSTOR
* Dowe, Pearl K. Ford, et al. ''Remaking the Democratic Party: Lyndon B. Johnson as a Native-Son Presidential Candidate'' (University of Michigan Press, 2016).
* Feller, David. "Politics and Society: Toward a Jacksonian Synthesis" ''Journal of the Early Republic'' 10#2 (1990), pp. 135–16
in JSTOR
* Finkelman, Paul, and Peter Wallenstein, eds. ''The encyclopedia of American political history'' (CQ Press, 2001).
* Frymer, Paul. ''Black and blue: African Americans, the labor movement, and the decline of the Democratic party'' (Princeton UP, 2008).
* Gerring, John. "A chapter in the history of American party ideology: The nineteenth-century Democratic Party (1828–1892)." ''Polity'' 26.4 (1994): 729–768
online
*
online
* Greene, Jack B. ''Encyclopedia of American Political History'' (1983)
* Hilton, Adam. ''True Blues: The Contentious Transformation of the Democratic Party'' (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2021), since 1972.
* Kazin, Michael. ''What It Took to Win: A History of the Democratic Party'' (2022
online
* Kazin, Michael. ed. ''The Princeton Encyclopedia of American Political History'' (2 vol. Princeton UP, 2009)
** Kazin, Michael. ed. ''The Concise Princeton Encyclopedia of American Political History'' (Princeton UP, 2011)
* Landis, Michael Todd. ''Northern Men with Southern Loyalties: The Democratic Party and the Sectional Crisis''. (Cornell UP, 2014).
* Lawrence, David G. ''The collapse of the democratic presidential majority: Realignment, dealignment, and electoral change from Franklin Roosevelt to Bill Clinton''. (Westview Press, 1997).
*
* L. Sandy Maisel, Maisel, L. Sandy, and Jeffrey M. Berry, eds. ''The Oxford handbook of American political parties and interest groups'' (Oxford UP, 2010).
* L. Sandy Maisel, Maisel, L. Sandy, and Charles Bassett, eds. ''Political parties & elections in the United States: an encyclopedia'' (2 vol, Garland, 1991)
* Mieczkowski, Yanek, and Mark C Carnes. ''The Routledge historical atlas of presidential elections'' (2001).
* Neal, Steven. ''Happy Days are Here Again: The 1932 Democratic Convention, the Emergence of FDR—and how America was Changed Forever'' (HarperCollins, 2010).
* Remini, Robert V. ''Martin Van Buren and the making of the Democratic Party'' (Columbia UP, 1961).
* Savage, Sean J. ''Roosevelt: The Party Leader, 1932–1945'' (U Press of Kentucky, 2015).
* Savage, Sean J. ''JFK, LBJ, and the Democratic Party'' (SUNY Press, 2012).
* Savage, Sean J. ''Truman and the Democratic Party'' (U Press of Kentucky, 2015).
* Woods, Randall B. ''Prisoners of Hope: Lyndon B. Johnson, the Great Society, and the Limits of Liberalism'' (Basic Books, 2016).
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Democratic Party
Democratic Party (United States),
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Centre-left parties
Liberal parties in the United States
Political parties established in 1828
Political parties in the United States
Social liberal parties in the United States
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Feminist political parties in the United States