With the exit of Paul Ryan, Speaker of the House, the GOP is leaving the stage after more than a century and a half. As Publius showed over two years ago in Our Constitutional Crisis, the GOP collapse began in 2002 when the Tea Party began the process of hijacking Republican ballot lines because it was so much cheaper than starting a third party.
A little history. Americans are terrified of third parties. The last time one was successful, Lincoln won the Presidency and the country exploded in a civil war. Because of this, Americans will do anything to prevent the rise of another party.
To put a third party on the ballot state-wide in New York, for example, you must get signatures in each Congressional District from at least 5% of the number who last voted for governor. To get around this insanity quickly and inexpensively, the Tea Party simply hijacked GOP ballot lines.
This was a brilliant move. In the 2010 election, the Democrats secured 193 seats, the GOP 181, and the Tea Party 61, gaining the Tea Party the swing vote. Voila, three parties. And a massive constitutional crisis.
Here’s why.
To students of constitutional development like Publius, 2010 spelled a Democratic minority or a GOP-Tea Party coalition. In most countries, the largest party, the Democrats, would get the first chance to form a government, either by forming a coalition with one of the other parties or by getting some agreement on a governing agenda as a minority. Failing that, the second party, the GOP, would get its chance.
As a rule, whichever party won the confidence of the House would stay in power until it failed on a money bill or fell on a vote of non-confidence. This would usually result in a snap election that might, or might not, unlock the House.
We have no such fluidity in our 1787 Constitution. Elections for the House are fixed at every two years and for the Senate at one third of Senators every two years. The GOP coalition failed on several money bills and nothing happened. If things get stuck, they stay stuck until the next cycle.
In the House, everything depends on the Speaker’s ability to manage this muddle. If the Speaker cannot meet the challenge—and there is no Constitutional system for forcing the Speaker’s resignation and/or dissolving the House—we enter a prolonged period of stagnation. Where we are now.
Like Boehner before him, Ryan recognized the hopelessness of his position and will resign.
This was so obvious to anyone who could count that Publius warned his GOP friends well before the 2010 election that their priority then was not Obama—they could forget him for the moment—but getting the Tea Party off GOP ballot lines. If the GOP did not act fast, Publius warned, its outlook was just like that of the badly split U.K. Liberals following the First World War: a miserable slide into irrelevance as the Labour Party rose and rose. And huge opportunities for the unexpected. An opportunity Don Trump grabbed with gusto a half-decade later.
Oblivious, Speaker Boehner did not unlock this mess and the House became gridlocked. Boehner got a reprieve in the 2012 cycle, following which the Democrats climbed to 200 seats, the GOP stayed at 181 and the Tea Party dropped ten to 51. He should have used this Tea Party setback to force the Tea Party off the ballot GOP line. He failed to do this.
Naturally, things got worse. In 2016, the Freedom Caucus entered the lists, also by hijacking GOP ballot lines, winning 33 seats. The Tea Party won 40, a sharp decline. The GOP, or whatever remains of it, has only 168 seats in the House. The Democrats have 194, six more than in 2014. Between them, the Tea Party and the Freedom Caucus control the swing vote with their 73 seats. Dumb Don came in so weakened by this mess that, when it was layered onto his massive intellectual insufficiencies, he fast became the weakest President since Buchanan.
The GOP lost seats to the Democrats on one side and to its three party-split on the other. It is on life support. Boehner’s replacement, Paul Ryan, proved himself spectacularly inept and just announced that he will not run again in the 2018 midterm elections. Ryan was unable to pull an Angela Merkel and get his three-party coalition to agree to a common platform.
Ryan's resignation—he is being joined by 36 others in the GOP—in effect dissolves the failing GOP Establishment rump and surrenders what is left to the Tea Party, the Freedom Caucus and anyone else who can grab a piece.
For students of U.S. history, this is one of the biggest moments since Lincoln brought the GOP to power in the 1860 election. The GOP is going and we have no idea what will replace it or in what combination.
May 18, 2018
This is getting easy!! In a perfect display of the four party dynamics Publius explained here more than two years ago, Paul Ryan lead a Farm Bill to defeat at the hands of the balance-of-power holders, the Freedom Caucus.
The problem for the GOP is lack of basic education. If you asked the GOP to explain the lesson's of Asquith's administration on the working dynamics of parliamentary democracy you would get back something like, "What's an Asquith?"
The fact that there is no return to Asquith's glory days is beyond them. Political illiteracy is very expensive!!
And, as explained here, the Farm Bill is a money bill. Anywhere else, failure on a money bill means the GOP Coalition would have been out on its butt the same day and we would have a new government, likely a Democrat-GOP rump alliance.
Here it just means more of the same for whatever is left of the congressional term.
And, because the GOP doesn't have the brains to get the Tea Party and Freedom Caucus off its ballot lines, we are likely to get more of the same for the next congressional term and the one after that. Saving, of course, disgust with Dumb Don's mental insufficiencies widespread enough to kiss off the GOP Coalition.
A warning to Democrats: don't think you can avoid the same fate. Take the GOP Coalition lesson to heart. Keep other parties off your ballot lines at all costs. If you don't, you too will come apart at the seams.