Just curious if their has ever been a coalition government even once in U.S. history, I haven’t been able to find any information on this at all. And if not, do you think America would benefit from one, obviously the U.S. would need to have more parties first in government.
For reference, a coalition government is when two or more parties form a “coalition”, allowing them to form a government by the nature of the coalition being the largest political body in a legislature.
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Our main political parties themselves function as big coalitions of various factions known as caucuses, who necessarily must quarrel and compromise with each other against their various competing interests. They’re very much not homogeneous in ideology as Europeans expect political parties to be. Our two big parties are much more fractured and factionalized than even they themselves publicly try to present them themselves as.
That said early in our country’s history the vice president was the runner up in the election and was generally of the opposing party.
Parties wane and wax. They themselves also evolve. They are not monoliths with everyone inside of a party abiding by the same platforms and policies.
The way America’s election system works, we really only get two big parties who are diametrically opposed to each other, as opposed to multiple medium parties like most of Europe gets. So coalition governments aren’t really a thing in the US.
No, it isn’t even possible. The reason is simple: we don’t have a Prime Minister. We have a President. And only one President. He is elected as an individual. He is not the leader of a “party” like “Labour” or the “Liberal Democrats.”
The political parties are not a part of our government structure officially. They have no authority to force members to vote a certain way, and they do not have the authority to fill a seat should it become vacant. We vote for the individual and the parties are simply a short hand way to communicate general policy positions of the candidates.
Every American political party is a coalition by European standards.
This isn’t even possible the way the US government is structured.
Also, we have a lot of parties, there were 12 on my last presidential ballot, parties are not a codified function of our government.
In addition to what others are saying, we do not really “form a government” in the sense you mean. All elected representatives, plus appointed positions and non-elected workers, are considered part of “the government.”
We build our coalitions within the parties. Republicans include evangelicals, libertarians, old school conservatives, “crunchy cons,” etc.
The Democrats have everyone ranging from out and out communists to centrist democrats.
Two parties that vie for various slices of the electorate rather than 20 parties that make coalitions in a parliament.
The GOP and Dems are effectively coalition parties in the European sense. Though, in the house in the 1850’s there was a Know-Nothing/GOP coalition to install an anti-slavery speaker.
The closest they’ve gotten to that was 1864 when the Republican Party was briefly the National Union Party in an attempt to unite both parties to take on a greater evil: the confederacy
>For reference, a coalition government is when two or more parties form a “coalition”, allowing them to **form a government** by the nature of the coalition being the largest political body in a legislature.
What do you mean form a government? Do you just mean to cooperate?
My state of Washington has 10 representatives and 2 senators. Each citizen votes for their 1 rep and 2 senators. I, the voter, vote for individuals regardless of their party — I do not vote for parties AND the parties do not control who gets to run under their party name.
Whatever rag-tag group wins the general election is who Washington state sends to DC
No, we don’t have a parliamentary system. Cooperation is needed to pass laws and such but not to “form a government.” The government is always there and the executive is not chosen by the legislature.
Parliamentary systems have an idea of “government” where a quorum of sorts is needed to do anything. Our election system is more like a moving train that doesn’t stop. If someone falls out then a temporary replacement is appointed, typically by the executive of the state whose seat has become vacant, who serves until the next election rolls around, which is usually within two years.
One way to put it is that parliamentary systems move pebbles around until it meets a minimum requirement to be considered a valid government. The American system pours pebbles into defined boxes whose structure is the government.
The president being a single individual means the executive branch will necessarily always be controlled by a single party.
However, that president’s party affiliation has no bearing on congress. So, we often find ourselves with “divided” government, where different parties control the White House and Congress, and they must come to some agreement to pass any laws or budgets. That’s certainly not a “coalition” government, but it does require some amount of cooperation between opponents, at least. Most of Obama’s administration, and the second half of Trump’s, were years of “divided” government.
The closest thing to a “coalition” government would be the current situation in the US Senate. Democrats have the Senate majority, by literally the slimmest margin possible. First, it’s all based on a 50-50 tie, with Democrats on top only because the vice-president is the tie-breaker.
But beyond that, Democrats don’t really have 50 seats in the senate. The current majority is made up of 48 Democrats and 2 Independents, who caucus with the Democrats. You could almost call that a “coalition” government, which elects a Senate Majority Leader, rather than a Prime Minister.
There is no concept of a coalition government in a Presidential system. The executive branch is separate from the legislature. In parliamentary systems the executive branch (if you can even call it a separate branch) is practically an outgrowth of the legislature.
The makeup of the executive branch in the US system has nothing to do with the composition of congress at any given time. You could have a President of one party, or no party at all, and a congress dominated by another party. A congressional election could swing the balance in Congress and it would not impact who is the executive, unlike a parliamentary system.
The legislature does not “form a government” in a Presidential system like ours. So as you can see, the very concept of a coalition government has no meaning in a system like this. Congress has its elections and the executive has an election. The executive is not chosen by congress.
No, our system is completely different, and the concept of a coalition doesn’t really translate. The President and each member of congress is directly elected. We don’t have to form a government, although the president does have to select a cabinet that the Senate will approve, they can’t really “fail to form a government”. Cabinet selections are almost always approved anyway, although sometimes the nominations are withdrawn before they can be voted on. Even if the Senate rejects a cabinet nominees, the president can just nominate someone else until they reach a common ground.
In a more abstract manner, the two large US parties act more somewhat like European coalitions. They are far more ideologically diverse than European parties because the American Parties have far less control over their members. If a US party kicks a member out, they don’t lose their seat, they just become an Independent. For instance,in 2006 Joe Lieberman famously lost his primary election in the Democratic Party to run for his reelection as the Senator from Connecticut, but ran as an Independent and won the general election. This would eventually result in Joe Lieberman, the senator from the state of Connecticut, who’s primary economic engine is insurance companies, having the tie breaking vote on the Affordable Healthcare Act. Leiberman would not vote for a version of the healthcare reform bill that might jeopardize Connecticut’s insurance industry, so the Affordable Healthcare Act was not able add a “public option” healthcare plan.
In the traditional sense, no there has not been.
Practically, however, the GOP and Dems are both coalitions of various right/left wing ideologies. It’s why strong government paleo-conservatives are in the same party as small government libertarians (the GOP), or social progressives in the same party as more status quo liberals (Dems)
We do not have a parliamentary system, so coalitions are not a thing, different systems.