TheDemocratic Party is an American political party that has significantly evolved and includes various factions throughout its history. Into the 21st century, the liberal faction represents themodern American liberalism that began with theNew Deal in the 1930s and continued with both theNew Frontier andGreat Society in the 1960s. The moderate faction supportsThird Way politics that includescenter-left social policies andcentrist fiscal policies, mostly associated with theNew Democrats andClintonism of the 1990s, while the left-wing faction (known as progressives) advocates forprogressivism andsocial democracy. Historical factions of the Democratic Party include the foundingJacksonians, theCopperheads andWar Democrats during theAmerican Civil War, theRedeemers,Bourbon Democrats, andSilverites in the late-19th century, and theSouthern Democrats andNew Deal Democrats in the 20th century. Theearly Democratic Party was also influenced byJeffersonians and theYoung America movement.

TheKennedy brothers: 35th PresidentJohn F. Kennedy (right), Attorney GeneralRobert F. Kennedy (left), and SenatorTed Kennedy (middle) in 1963

The Kennedy family dynasty was extremely influential to the development and popularity of the modern American liberal movement throughout the 1960s.

Modern liberalism in the United States began during theProgressive Era with PresidentTheodore Roosevelt (aRepublican) and hisSquare Deal andNew Nationalism policies, with center-left ideas increasingly leaning toward the political philosophy of social liberalism, better known in the United States as modern liberalism. FollowingFranklin D. Roosevelt'sNew Deal,Harry S. Truman'sFair Deal,John F. Kennedy'sNew Frontier, andLyndon B. Johnson'sGreat Society (the latter of which establishedMedicare andMedicaid) further established the popularity of liberalism in the nation and became part the Democratic tradition.^[1]: 91 While the resurgence of conservatism and theThird Way ofBill Clinton'sNew Democrats briefly weakened the influence of modern liberalism,Barack Obama acted as an ideological bridge. While characterizing himself as a New Democrat, Obama toed the ideological line between Third Way and modern liberalism.^[2][3]

The key legislative achievement of theObama administration, the passage and enactment of thePatient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), was generally supported among liberal Democrats.^[5] Under Obama, Democrats achieved an expansion of LGBT rights and federal hate crime laws, rescinded theMexico City policy (later reinstituted by PresidentDonald Trump) and the ban on federal taxpayer dollars to fund research onembryonic stem cells, and implemented theJoint Comprehensive Plan of Action and theCuban thaw.^[6]

44th PresidentBarack Obama during his swearing in ceremony in 2009

TheObama-Biden administration was known for helping bridge the ideological gap between contemporary American liberalism and the politically moderate Third Way movement, the latter a faction that dominated politics in the decade prior.

In 2011, theDemocratic Leadership Council, which supported centrist and Third Way positions, was dissolved. In 2016, Democratic presidential nomineeHillary Clinton eschewed her husband's "New Covenant" centrism and pursued more liberal proposals, such as rolling back mandatory minimum sentencing laws, a debt-free college tuition plan for public university students, and a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.^[7][8] PresidentJoe Biden, a moderate Democrat, also adopted more traditional liberal policies during his presidency and was more willing to address the concern of the progressive wing than Presidents Clinton and Obama.^[9]

Liberals include most of academia,^[10] as well as large portions of theprofessional class.^[11] The liberal wing differs from the traditional organized labor base. According to political scientists Matt Grossmann and David A. Hopkins, the increase ineducational attainment in the United States has led to the increase of liberalism in the Democratic Party.^[12]

42nd PresidentBill Clinton and 45th Vice PresidentAl Gore in 1993

TheClinton-Gore administration marked the height of the politically moderateThird Way movement (also known asClintonism) within the Democratic Party during the 1990s.

Generally speaking, moderate Democrats are Democrats who are fiscally moderate-to-conservative and socially moderate-to-liberal.^[13] They are more likely to be located inswing states andswing seats.^[14] The success of modern liberalism was weakened with the presidency ofRonald Reagan and the ensuing tide of conservative popularity in response to a perception of liberal failure.^[15] In reaction to angst following Reagan's landslide victory over liberal DemocratWalter Mondale in the1984 United States presidential election, the Third Way movement was formed. It is associated with thepresidency of Bill Clinton and theNew Democrats.^[16][17]

During the1992 United States presidential election, Clinton and running mateAl Gore ran as New Democrats who were willing to synthesizefiscally conservative views with the moreculturally liberal position of the Democratic Party ethos, or to harmonize center-left andcenter-right politics. Clinton was both the first Democrat elected president since 1976 and the first re-elected to a second full term since 1948. Most moderate Democrats in theUnited States House of Representatives are members of theNew Democrat Coalition, although there is considerable overlap in the membership of New Democrats and Blue Dogs, with most Blue Dogs also being New Democrats.^[18] PresidentsBarack Obama andJoe Biden largely tried to unify the various factions of the Democratic Party while still addressing the goals of the progressive wing, although Obama was hammered by the conservative factions and theTea Party movement.^[9] The Third Way is still a large coalition in the modern Democratic Party. Clinton himself helped to move the Democratic Party beyond the New Democrats and the Third Way, owing to a more favorable political context than the 1990s, with Obama andHillary Clinton representing a more liberal ambitious vision.^[3]

The Blue Dog Coalition, commonly known as Blue Dogs or Blue Dog Democrats, is a caucus ofmoderate members from the Democratic Party in the House of Representatives.^[19][20][21] The Blue Dog Coalition was originally founded in 1995 as a group ofconservative Democrats focused on fiscal responsibility. In the 2010s, the Blue Dogs became more demographically diverse and less conservative.^[22] As of May–August 2023 during the118th United States Congress, 10House Democrats were part of the Blue Dog Coalition.^[23][24]

The modern progressive wing draws deeply from the progressive economic and political philosophies ofWoodrow Wilson'sNew Freedom andFranklin D. Roosevelt'sNew Deal, and more broadly from theNew Deal coalition. Historically, progressives were not limited to the Democratic Party, and the modern progressives in the Democratic Party are influenced by the activist reformism ofTheodore Roosevelt (particularly theSquare Deal andNew Nationalism, which in turn influenced the New Freedom and the New Deal) andHerbert Croly (who rejected the thesis that the liberal tradition was inhospitable toanti-capitalist alternatives), as well asLa Follette family (particularlyRobert M. La Follette who founded theProgressive Party in 1924) and former Franklin D. Roosevelt's Vice PresidentHenry A. Wallace, who founded anotherProgressive Party in 1948 after denouncing theanti-Communist foreign policy of the liberal PresidentHarry S. Truman.^[25]

Thehistorical progressive wing of the Democratic Party is associated withWilliam Jennings Bryan and thePeople's Party. They gained control of the party in 1896, when the Democratic Party selected at that time the youngest presidential candidate in Bryan and repudiated the more conservative administration ofGrover Cleveland, and kept it until 1908, the last time Bryan was the presidential nominee. With the exception of 1904, when theBourbon Democrats and conservative allies of Cleveland regained control while Theodore Roosevelt's platform included progressive policies advocated by Bryan and his supporters, the Democratic Party nominee was from the progressive wing. Bryan and the historical progressives successfully turned the Democratic Party from a conservative party to a progressive alliance that elected Wilson, Franklin D. Roosevelt,John F. Kennedy, andLyndon B. Johnson.^[26]

Unlike some members of the historical progressive wing, such as Bryan who held fundamentalist religious views,^[26] modern progressives in the Democratic Party aresecular andculturally liberal onsocial issues like race and identity, where they draw inspiration from theCivil Rights Act of 1964 and theVoting Rights Act of 1965 proposed by President Kennedy, enacted by President Johnson, and advocated for byMartin Luther King Jr.^[27] While it does not transcend the political philosophy of modern liberalism, the progressive wing has fused tenets of cultural liberalism with the economic left-leaning traditions of theProgressive Era, as well as drawing more robustly fromKeynesian economics,left-wing populism, and democratic socialism/social democracy, particularly through Franklin D. Roosevelt'sFour Freedoms.^[28]

President Johnson andcivil rights movement activists, such as King, were influential to progressives not only for their positions on race and identity but also on economics, for example Johnson for theGreat Society, which has been called by some a "secondReconstruction",^{[1]: 91 [29]} or King for his support ofdemocratic socialism.^[30] While there are differences between them, both historical progressivism and themodern progressive movement share the belief thatfree markets lead to economic inequalities, and therefore that the free market must be aggressively monitored and regulated with broadeconomic and social rights to protect the working class.^[31]

The Congressional Progressive Caucus is a caucus of progressiveHouse Democrats in theUnited States Congress, along with one independent in the Senate (Bernie Sanders),^[32] a progressive who identifies as a democratic socialist,^[33] and ran in the 2016 and 2020 Democratic presidential primaries.^[34][35][36] Sanders is credited, alongside the Democratic Party's broader progressive wing,^[37] with influencing a leftward shift in the party,^[38][39][40] as well as for the election of several democratic socialists within the Democratic Party.^[41] In 2016, theBlue Collar Caucus, a pro-labor and anti-outsourcing caucus, was formed by representativesMarc Veasey andBrendan Boyle.^[42][43]

Since 2019, there have been at least six democratic socialists in the House of Representatives as members of the Democratic Party, and in doing so some of them defeated notable New Democrats incumbents, such asJoe Crowley andEliot Engel, in the primaries.^[44] As of 2024, at least thirteen ofsocialist Democratic representatives had at some point been affiliated with theDemocratic Socialists of America (DSA), includingAlexandria Ocasio-Cortez,^[45]Rashida Tlaib,^[45] andGreg Casar, who was elected in 2024 to lead the progressive caucus.^[46][47] Former Democratic representatives, such asRon Dellums,^[48]David Bonior,Major Owens,^[48]John Conyers,Jerry Nadler,Danny K. Davis,^[41]Shri Thanedar,^[49]Cori Bush,^[48] andJamaal Bowman,^[50] were also affiliated with the DSA.^[48]

TheSquad and specificallyAlexandria Ocasio-Cortez,^[51][52] elevated progressive politics, and influenced the country and party.^[53] The progressive wing has voiced support for legislation such as theGreen New Deal andMedicare for All.^[54][55]

Theconservative coalition was an unofficial coalition in theUnited States Congress bringing together a conservative majority of the Republican Party and the conservative, mostlySouthern wing of theDemocratic Party. It was dominant in Congress from 1937 to 1963 and remained a political force until the mid-1980s, eventually dying out in the 1990s. In terms of Congressional roll call votes, it primarily appeared on votes affecting labor unions. The conservative coalition did not operate on civil rights bills, for the two wings had opposing viewpoints. However, the coalition did have the power to prevent unwanted bills from even coming to a vote. The coalition included many committee chairmen from the South who blocked bills by not reporting them from their committees. Furthermore,Howard W. Smith, Chairman of theHouse Rules Committee, often could kill a bill simply by not reporting it out with a favorable rule and he lost some of that power in 1961. The conservative coalition was not concerned with foreign policy as most of theSouthern Democrats were internationalists, a position opposed by mostRepublicans.^{[citation needed]}

Today, conservative Democrats are generally regarded as members of the Democratic Party who are more conservative than the national political party as a whole. TheBlue Dog Coalition was originally founded as a group ofconservative Democrats. After reaching a peak of 59 members in 2008,^{[citation needed]} the caucus was decimated following the 2010 election, reduced to only 26 members. The caucus has shifted left in recent years, adopting more liberal stances on social issues and aligning more closely with Democratic Party policies. The Coalition remains the most conservative grouping of Democrats in the house, broadly adoptingsocially liberal andfiscally conservative policies and promoting fiscal restraint, although some members retainsocially conservative views. Currently,^{[as of?]} 10 House members are part of the Blue Dog Coalition.^{[citation needed]}

The following table lists coalitions' electoral results for the House of Representatives.

Jeffersonians, named after founding fatherThomas Jefferson, was a political movement in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. While it dominated theFirst Party System which predates the Democratic Party, many of its beliefs influenced the party throughout the 19th century. These beliefs were concentrated around the beliefs ofrepublicanism andagrarianism. Other than Jefferson, who is considered the father of the Democratic Party, early notable Jeffersonians includedVirginia dynasty U.S. PresidentsJames Madison andJames Monroe.^{[1]: 88–89}

Jacksonianism was the foundational ideology of the Democratic Party with the election ofAndrew Jackson as president in 1828, and it was the predominant faction of the party until the 1840s. It represented the politics of Jackson, which were a modified form of Jeffersonianism.^{[1]: 89–90} Other than Jackson, notable Jacksonian Democrats include presidentsMartin Van Buren andJames K. Polk. Jacksonians supported a small federal government and stronger state governments, and promoted territorial expansionism, following Jefferson with his 1803purchase of Louisiana. They were also opponents ofcentral banking, which represented an early factional division in the Democratic Party when Jacksonians competed against pro-bank Democrats.^{[60]: 19–20}

Opponents of the Jacksonian faction, such asHenry Clay,Daniel Webster, andWilliam Henry Harrison, left the Democratic Party to found theWhig Party, which served as the main opposition to Jacksonian Democrats until the rise of the Republican Party.^[1]: 89 The Democrats led by the Jacksonian faction won all presidential elections but two (1840 and 1848), and dominated national politics until the early 1860s.^[1]: 89 Jacksonians supported the Southern United States on several issues, includingslavery, arguing that it was permissible on the grounds ofstates' rights, andprotective tariffs, opposing them on the grounds that they disproportionately benefited the North.^{[60]: 23–25} Despite their national success, the early Democrats ultimately crumbled over the issue of slavery andsecession, withNorthern Democrats more favorable to the stop or end of slavery andSouthern Democrats overwhelmingly supportive of it. Even if the Democrats were united in 1860, it is doubtful they would have defeatedAbraham Lincoln.^{[1]: 89–90}

TheYoung America movement was a political movement in the 1830s throughout the 1850s. While not an explicit political faction, it impacted many Democratic party ideals though its promotion ofcapitalism andmanifest destiny, and broke with the agrarian andstrict constructionist orthodoxies of the past; it embraced commerce, technology, regulation, reform, and internationalism. Notable promoters included PresidentFranklin Pierce and 1860 presidential nomineeStephen A. Douglas.^[60]: 144 Pierce became the first elected president who had his renomination denied by his own party. This happened because he had aliened fellow Northern Democrats when he signed theKansas–Nebraska Act, which was drafted by Douglas, that effectively repealed theMissouri Compromise of 1820 and allowed slavery into theKansas Territory.^[1]: 89

TheFree Soil Party had many former members of the Democratic Party, most notably their 1848 presidential candidate and former PresidentMartin Van Buren. The party's main platform was opposition to the expansion ofslavery into new territories acquired from theMexican–American War.^[61] Many anti-slaveryNorthern Democrats voted for Van Buren in 1848, and paved the way for the win of theWhig Party and the election ofZachary Taylor.^[1]: 89

During theAmerican Civil War, the Democratic Party split into several factions: theFire Eaters, theCopperheads or Peace Democrats, andWar Democrats. The Fire-Eaters wereSouthern Democrats who promoted the idea ofSouthern secession prior to the Civil War. They sought to preserve slavery throughout the United States. The Copperheads were a faction of Northern Democrats during the Civil War that sought an immediate end to the war. Many Copperheads sympathized with theConfederacy, with members accused by Republicans as treasonous. They promoted the ideas of agrarianism inspired from Jacksonian thought that appealed to many poor farmers in border states. The War Democrats were a group of Democrats that opposed the Copperheads and supported PresidentAbraham Lincoln's stance towards the South and bring it back in theUnion; however, they objected to Lincoln's emancipation policies and after 1863 were increasingly less enthusiastic about the war and its goals.^[1]: 90 Despite this, the War Democrats allied with Republicans under theNational Union ticket to compete in the1864 United States elections.^[62]Redeemers were Southern Democrats that after the end of the Civil War sought to returnwhite supremacists to power in the South. They were opposed to the expansion of rights given to Black Americans and were associated with groups like theWhite League,Red Shirts, and theKu Klux Klan.^[63]

Following the end of the Civil War, several factions emerged in the Democratic Party during theThird Party System, such as theBourbon Democrats (1872–1912) andSilverites (1870s–1890s). During theGilded Age, or from around 1877 to 1896, the only Democratic president to win both theElectoral College andpopular vote was the Bourbon DemocratGrover Cleveland (1885–1889 and 1893–1897).^[1]: 90 During theFourth andFifth Party Systems in the 20th century, new factions like theProgressives (1890s–1910s) and theNew Deal coalition (1930s–1970s) arose.^{[1]: 91–92} From 1897 to 1932, the only Democratic president wasWoodrow Wilson (1913–1921). Although he enacted a series of progressive reforms that came to define modern liberalism, Wilsonde facto imposedracial segregation in the federal government.^{[1]: 90 [64]}

The New Deal coalition began after election ofFranklin D. Roosevelt in 1932 during theGreat Depression.^{[1]: 91–92} Theconservative coalition was an unofficial coalition in theUnited States Congress bringing together a conservative majority of the Republican Party and the conservative, mostlySouthern wing of the Democratic Party. It was dominant in Congress from 1937 to 1963, until PresidentLyndon B. Johnson signed theCivil Rights Act of 1964 into law.^{[1]: 91–92 [65]} It was only until afterWorld War II that the Democratic Party began to support civil rights towardsracial equality, starting with PresidentHarry S. Truman desegregating the United States Armed Forces (Executive Order 9981) in 1948.^[66] That same year, Truman's civil rights policies of hisFair Deal led toconservative Democrats to leave the party and form theDixiecrats. There was also a split with the progressive wing, asHenry A. Wallace founded theProgressive Party. Despite the splits, Truman won the1948 United States presidential election.^[1]: 91 Harold D. Woodman summarizes the explanation that external forces caused the disintegration of theJim Crow South from the 1920s to the 1970s:^[67]

When a significant change finally occurred, its impetus came from outside the South. Depression-bred New Deal reforms, war-induced demand for labor in the North, perfection of cotton-picking machinery, and civil rights legislation and court decisions finally ... destroyed the plantation system, undermined landlord or merchant hegemony, diversified agriculture and transformed it from a labor- to a capital-intensive industry, and ended the legal and extra-legal support for racism. The discontinuity that war, invasion, military occupation, the confiscation of slave property, and state and national legislation failed to bring in the mid-19th century, finally arrived in the second third of the 20th century. A "second reconstruction" created a real New South.^[29]

After the Republicanpresidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower, Democrats narrowly won the1960 United States presidential election andJohn F. Kennedy became the firstRoman Catholic to be elected U.S. president. Through theNew Frontier, his domestic policies mirrored that of traditional liberalism (Wilson's New Freedom, Roosevelt's New Deal, and Truman's Fair Deal), continued the foreign policies ofliberal internationalism, and made further civil rights advances. He was cautious about civil rights due to the power of Southern Democrats, which was only dealt with by President Johnson thanks to his skills as a former Senate majority leader.^[1]: 91 As a result, theSolid South was no longer Democratic.^{[1]: 91–92}

Throughout the 20th century,Southern factions within the Democratic Party emerged and held significant power around the issue of civil rights, segregation, and other issues. These included theconservative coalition (1930s–1960s), theSolid South (1870s–1960s),Dixiecrats (1940s), and theboll weevils (1980s). In 1968, PresidentLyndon B. Johnson's policies in Vietnam were unpopular and divided the party, eventually leading to his withdrawal from the presidential race. His Vice PresidentHubert Humphrey was nominated the presidential nominee without a competitive primary. These factors, coupled with competition from theAmerican Independent Party candidateGeorge Wallace, a conservative Southern Democrat and former governor of Alabama, contributed to his narrow defeat toRichard Nixon.^[1]: 92

During the 1970s, the Democratic Party significantly reformed their selection of delegates and presidential nomination rules. Changes included minority representation, an equal delegations division between men and women, and delegates being awarded on a proportional basis. The progressiveGeorge McGovern lost in a landslide to Nixon in 1972.Jimmy Carter, a Southern Democrat, was elected to the presidency of 1976, also thanks toGerald Ford's unpopularity and his pardon of Nixon for his criminal activities in theWatergate scandal; however, inflation and foreign issues doomed Carter's re-election bid in 1980. With the worldwide rise ofneoliberalism in the 1970s and the dismantling of theKeynesian post-war consensus amid astagflation and an energy crisis, the New Deal era came to an end and was followed by theReagan era, with Republicans dominating the 1980s.^[1]: 92

After twelve years of Republican presidencies, Democrats returned to theWhite House in 1992 with another Southern Democrat,Bill Clinton, who ran as a moderate ("The era of big government is over") and with the strategy "It's the economy, stupid". Clinton became the first Democrat to win the presidency without winning Texas, and histicket withAl Gore, another Southern Democrat, was the first successful all-South ticket since that ofAndrew Jackson andJohn C. Calhoun in 1828. Clinton and Gore were successful in regaining the support ofReagan Democrats.^[1]: 92 Until the "Republican Revolution" of 1994, when voters returned a RepublicanCongress despite peace, an improved economy, and high approval job ratings of theClinton presidency,^[1]: 92 most Southern members of the House of Representatives were Democrats.^[68]

The conservative coalition remained a political force until the mid-1980s, eventually dying out in the 1990s. In terms of congressional roll call votes, it primarily appeared on votes affecting labor unions. The conservative coalition did not operate on civil rights bills, for the two wings had opposing viewpoints.^[69] The conservative coalition had the power to prevent unwanted bills from even coming to a vote. The coalition included many committee chairmen from the South who blocked bills by not reporting them from their committees. Furthermore,Howard W. Smith, chairman of theUnited States House Committee on Rules,^[70] often could kill a bill simply by not reporting it out with a favorable rule, although he lost some of that power in 1961. During thepresidency of Harry S. Truman, who was more worried about the Democratic Party's veering to the right, Smith once stated that union leaders were threatening to establish a labor chieftains-run plutocracy.^[71] The traditionalconservative Democratic faction lost much of its influence in the 21st century as the Southpolitically realigned towards theRepublican Party.^[72] Starting in the late 2010s to the early 2020s, a new set of moderate to conservative college-educated voters disillusioned withTrumpism began voting for Democrats.^[73][74]

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