¹ For various typologies of American elections, see Campbell, Angus, ‘A Classification of Presidential Elections’, in Campbell, Angus, Converse, Philip E., Miller, Warren E., and Stokes, Donald E., eds., Elections and the Political Order (New York: Wiley, 1966), pp. 63–77Google Scholar; Lichtman, Allan J., ‘Critical Election Theory and the Reality of American Presidential Politics, 1916–1940’, American Historical Review, LXXXI (1976), 317–50CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Pomper, Gerald, ‘Classification of Presidential Elections’, Journal of Politics, XXIX (1967), 535–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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⁵ Schattschneider, E. E., The Semi-Sovereign People (New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1960), p. 74.Google Scholar

⁶ The evidence for this view is contained in Beck, Paul Allen, ‘A Socialization Theory of Partisan Realignment’, in Niemi, Richard G., ed., The Politics of Future Citizens (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1974), pp. 199–219.Google Scholar

⁷ Individual-level corroboration of these aggregate results may be found in Nie, Norman H., Verba, Sidney and Petrocik, John R., The Changing American Voter (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1976), p. 67.Google Scholar

⁸ See, inter alia, Nie, , Verba, and Petrocik, , The Changing American Voter, pp. 164–73.Google Scholar

⁹ See Nie, , Verba, and Petrocik, , The Changing American Voter, p. 275.Google Scholar

¹⁰ See also Nie, , Verba, and Petrocik, , The Changing American Voter, p. 67.Google Scholar

¹¹ See Nie, , Verba, and Petrocik, , The Changing American Voter, pp. 164–73.Google Scholar

¹² The two Eisenhower presidential victories are the exception which proves the rule. The distribution of party loyalties in the electorate was highly stable during these two ‘deviating’ presidential elections and into the early 1960s.

¹³ Pomper, , ‘Classification of Presidential Elections’Google Scholar, and Key, V. O., ‘A Theory of Critical Elections’, Journal of Politics, XVII (1955), 3–18CrossRefGoogle Scholar, locate the beginning of the New Deal as early as 1928 for selected areas of New England. Virtually all other scholars have preferred later dates. Those locating it between the Crash of 1929 and the 1932 election are: Burnham, , Critical Elections and the Mainsprings of American PoliticsGoogle Scholar; Clubb, Jerome M. and Allen, Howard W., ‘The Cities and the Election of 1928: Partisan Realignment’, American Historical Review, LXXIV (1969), 1205–20CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Lichtman, , ‘Critical Election Theory…’Google Scholar; and Sellers, Charles, ‘The Equilibrium Cycle in Two-Party Polities’, Public Opinion Quarterly, XXX (1965), 16–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar A few have even placed the realignment after the 1932 election: Shively, W. Phillips, ‘A Reinterpretation of the New Deal Realignment’, Public Opinion Quarterly, XXXV (1971–1972), 621–4CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Shover, John L., ‘The Emergence of a Two-Party System in Republican Philadelphia, 1924–1934’, Journal of American History, LX (1974), 985–1002CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Sundquist, James L., Dynamics of the Party System (Washington, D.C.: The Brookings Institution, 1973).Google Scholar

¹⁴ Andersen, Kristi, ‘Generation, Partisan Shift, and Realignment; A Glance Back to the New Deal’Google Scholar, in Nie, , Verba, and Petrocik, , The Changing American Voter, pp. 74–95.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Reported in Sundquist, , Dynamics of the Party System, pp. 204–11.Google Scholar

¹⁶ See Shively, , ‘A Reinterpretation of the New Deal Realignment’Google Scholar, for data which suggest the class-based realignment came as late as 1936.

¹⁷ Andersen, , ‘Generation, Partisan Shift, and Realignment’.Google Scholar

¹⁸ This ballot had three features which distinguished it from the earlier systems in most of the states: it was prepared and administered by the state, all candidates for office were listed on it, and balloting was done in secret. See Rusk, Jerrold G., ‘The Effect of the Australian Ballot Reform on Split Ticket Voting: 1876–1908’, American Political Science Review, LXIV (1970), 1220–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹⁹ For the effects of the new ballot system see Rusk, ‘The Effect of the Australian Ballot Reform’. The impact of this and other reforms are discussed more generally in Converse, Philip E., ‘Change in the American Electorate’, in Campbell, Angus and Converse, Philip E., eds., The Human Meaning of Social Change (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1972), pp. 263–337.Google Scholar

²⁰ Converse, ‘Change in the American Electorate’, makes the case for the impact of electoral fraud on turnout.

²¹ Jensen describes the movements and countermovements between the two major parties by religious pietists and their liturgical opponents during this period. Early in the period, the Republicans received pietist support. By 1896, however, the pietists had captured the Democratic party, freeing the Republicans of their moralistic fringe and enabling it to attain majority status. Such wholesale movements from one party to another could only have taken place within an electorate whose party loyalties had eroded considerably. See Jensen, Richard J., The Winning of the Midwest: Social and Political Conflict, 1888–1896 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971), especially p. 307.Google Scholar

²² Both Pomper, , ‘Classification of Presidential Elections’Google Scholar; and Flanigan, William and Zingale, Nancy, ‘Electoral Competition and Partisan Realignment’Google Scholar (paper presented at the 1973 Convention of the American Political Science Association) found that the 1864 election exhibited the aggregate vote pattern characteristic of the culmination of a realignment: discontinuity with election results from preceding years, but continuity with those in subsequent years. The peak levels of turnout for the period were also recorded in 1864 for the states remaining in the Union (see Figure 3).

²³ See Lipset, Seymour Martin, Political Man (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1960), pp. 372–84.Google Scholar

²⁴ Ranney, Austin, Curing the Mischiefs of Faction (Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1975).Google Scholar

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²⁷ Beck, Paul Allen, ‘Environment and Party: The Impact of Political and Demographic County Characteristics on Party Behavior’, American Political Science Review, LXVIII (1974), 1229–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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³² This proposition is supported by Cover, who finds little evidence that use of perquisites has improved the chances of House incumbents and who favours a dealignment explanation for greater incumbent success. Cover, Albert D., ‘One Good Term Deserves Another: The Advantage of Incumbency in Congressional Elections’, American Journal of Political Science, III (1977), 523–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³³ The source for the data since 1861 is Clubb, and Traugott, , ‘Partisan Cleavage and Cohesion in the House of Representatives’.Google Scholar The earlier data come from Alexander, Thomas B., Sectional Stress and Party Strength (Nashville, Tenn.: Vanderbilt University Press, 1967).Google Scholar

³⁴ This conclusion is supported, where the data are available, using an even more restrictive measure of party voting: 90 per cent of one party voting against 90 per cent of the other. See Brady, David W. and Althoff, Phillip, ‘Party Voting in the US House of Representatives, 1890–1910: Elements of a Responsible Party System’, The Journal of Politics, XXXVI (1974), 753–77CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Lowell, A. Lawrence, ‘The Influence of Party Upon Legislation in England and America’, Annual Report of the American Historical Association (Washington, D.C., 1901), pp. 341–548Google Scholar; and Turner, Julius and Schneier, Edward V. Jr., Party and Constituency (Baltimore, Md.: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1970).Google Scholar Thus, while the precise party voting scores are influenced by how party voting is defined, the cyclical patterns of party voting described in this study do not appear to be artifacts of the measure utilized.

³⁵ Clubb, and Traugott, , ‘Partisan Cleavage and Cohesion’.Google Scholar

³⁶ See Brady, David W., Congressional Voting in a Partisan Era (Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, 1973)Google Scholar; and Turner, and Schneier, , Party and Constituency.Google Scholar

³⁷ David Brady makes the point about the effects of the decentralization of power in ‘Congressional Leadership and Party Voting in the McKinley Era: A Comparison to the Modern House’, Midwest Journal of Political Science, XVI (1972), 439–59Google Scholar; Brady, , Congressional Voting;Google Scholar and Brady, and Althoff, , ‘Party Voting’.Google Scholar For the possible impact of malapportionment, see Robeck, Bruce W., ‘Legislative Partisanship, Constituency, and Malapportionment: The Case of California’, American Political Science Review, LXVI (1972), 1246–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³⁸ For 1897, see Brady, David W. and Lynn, Naomi B., ‘Switched-Seat Congressional Districts: Their Effect on Party Voting and Public Policy’, American Political Science Review, LXVII (1973), 528–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For 1933, see King, and Seligman, , ‘Critical Elections’.Google Scholar

³⁹ Polsby, , ‘The Institutionalization of the House of Representatives’.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ See Nelson, Garrison, ‘Partisan Patterns of House Leadership Change, 1789–1977’, American Political Science Review, LXXI (1977), 918–39.Google Scholar

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⁴⁴ See Dahl, Robert A., ‘Decision-Making in a Democracy: The Supreme Court as a National Policy-Maker’, Journal of Public Law, VI (1957), 279–95.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ Ginsberg, Benjamin, ‘Elections and Public Policy’, American Political Science Review, LXX (1976), 41–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁶ Hansen, Susan B., ‘Partisan Realignment and Tax Policy, 1789–1970’ (paper presented at the 1977 Convention of the American Political Science Association).Google Scholar

⁴⁷ Wildavsky, Aaron, The Politics of the Budgetary Process (Boston, Mass.: Little, Brown, 1964).Google Scholar

⁴⁸ Funston, Richard, ‘The Supreme Court and Critical Elections’, American Political Science Review, LXIX (1975), 795–811.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁹ This analysis is provided in Lopatto, Paul, ‘Realignments and Supreme Court Decision Making’ (unpublished manuscript, University of Pittsburgh, 1976).Google Scholar

⁵⁰ This point is made in reference to the 1890s by Paul, Arnold M., Conservative Crisis and the Rule of Law (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1960).Google Scholar

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⁵³ The voting of these newcomers is discussed in Brady, and Lynn, , ‘Switched-Seat Congressional Districts’Google Scholar; and Sinclair, Barbara Deckard, ‘Party Realignment and the Transformation of the Political Agenda: The House of Representatives, 1925–1938’, American Political Science Review, LXXI (1977), 940–53.Google Scholar

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⁵⁶ See Crewe, Ivor, Särlvik, Bo and Alt, James, ‘Partisan Dealignment in Britain, 1964–1974’, British Journal of Political Science, VII (1977), 129–90CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Crewe, Ivor, ‘Prospects for Party Realignment: An Anglo-American Comparison’Google Scholar (paper presented at the 1977 Convention of the American Political Science Association).

⁵⁷ See Inglehart, and Hochstein, , ‘Alignment and Dealignment’Google Scholar; and Cameron, David R., ‘Stability and Change in Patterns of French Partisanship’, Public Opinion Quarterly, XXXVI (1972), 19–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁵⁸ While recognizing the role of leadership in determining the nature of each electoral period, this interpretation clearly presumes that electoral changes are the cause, rather than the effect, of governmental changes. This presumption finds some support in the temporal ordering of the different types of changes, but in most cases it is impossible (as usual) to sort out cause from effect. The important variables in the operation of political systems simply cannot be isolated for causal analysis.