By Matthew Liptak
The possibility of a new American political party is not a failed trope. It is as real as the human dignity and love of freedom that inspires it.
Third parties in America have declined since the 1800s. But they continue to have a certain power and influence in American politics.
The Reform Party, once championed by Ross Perot, was a real player in presidential politics for the 1996 election, although Perot may have had more of an influence with his 1992 independent effort. The American Reform Party — an offshoot of Perot’s party — still exists.
And the Republican Party was once a third party. So why not have one now?
Conservative leadership, once held by standout leaders like Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan, has been absent from the Republican Party for decades. If Reagan’s “Shining city upon a hill” is going to burst forth from American conservatism again, it doesn’t appear to be coming from the Republican Party.
We need better, and better still exists in us. The conservative cause, as represented by the Republican Party, is in disarray. There’s a real need for new life being brought to the conservative perspective in America, but it is unlikely to come from the party of Donald Trump, the same party that claims to represent conservatism now.
Their failures are obvious. And true conservative philosophy will always exist on the American political spectrum. So why not create a new party truly representing it?
The benefits of doing so seem clear enough:
- A new party offers new hope for new candidates. Conservative candidates won’t have to wade through the failures of yesterday to deal with the necessities of today.
- A new party allows for power to be distributed among men and women who can truly be trusted. You know someone by the fruit they bear. Let’s hold leadership to that standard in a new party. The current leadership has led us to our current state. Is it better or worse?
- A new party offers new hope for conservatism expressed through an organization not sullied by dishonor. Even in this age, with its digital wonders, reputation matters.
- In that digital age, parties are still based on people. And likely always will be. But where once we had to wait until a newspaper covered the creation of a party for other Americans to learn about it, now word can spread faster and more freely. That may be an expediency needed right now to meet our national challenge.
I offer a proposed platform with the American Resolve Party. But it is simply a conversation starter. If American conviction toward its own inertia is stronger than its commitment to dreams of an American future, the conversation may never get started. There may be many paths to better conservative leadership in the United States. A third party can be one today.
The opportunity for a coalition of independent American conservative voices, grounded in reason and love of liberty and truth, meets a need we never have fully met. Multitudes of Americans with conservative leanings testify to those virtues every day. Let’s get together and get it done.
Matthew Liptak is a writer and editor from Maryland. He wrote this for InsideSources.com.
