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For information about the current Democratic Party, including its current composition and ideology, as well as a concise history of the party, see Democratic Party (United States).

The history of the Democratic Party of the United States is an account of the Democratic Party, which is one of the oldest political parties in the world.[1][2][3] During the "Second Party System", from 1832 to the mid-1850s, under presidents Andrew Jackson, (7th), Martin Van Buren, (8th) James K. Polk, (11th) and U.S. Senator Stephen Douglas, (1813-1861), of Illinois, (nominee of the violently-split Party Convention of the 1860 Presidential Election), the Democrats usually bested the opposition Whig Party by narrow margins, as both parties worked hard to build grass-roots organizations and maximize the turnout of voters. Both parties used patronage extensively to finance their operations, which included emerging big city machines as well as national networks of newspapers. The party was a proponent for farmers across the country, urban workers, and new immigrants. It advocated westward expansion, Manifest Destiny, greater equality among all white men, and opposition to the national bank.

From 1860 to 1932, in the era of the Civil War to the Great Depression, the recently organized in the mid-1850s, opposing Republican Party (from the ruins of the old previous Whig Party and some other smaller splinter groups) was dominant in presidential politics, as the Democrats elected only two presidents to four terms of office for 72 years, almost three-quarters of a century. Only Grover Cleveland (22nd and 24th President in 1884 and 1892), and 28th President Woodrow Wilson (in 1912 and 1916); the only other Democratic president to serve during this time was "War Democrat", the only U.S. Senator from a southern-seceding state who refused to leave, Andrew Johnson, (who later as Vice President in the unusual Presidential Election of 1864 on a unified "Unionist Party" ticket, was elevated to the Presidency after 16th President Abraham Lincoln's assassination in April 1865, but was never elected as president. Over the same period, the Democrats proved more competitive with the Republicans in Congressional politics, enjoying House of Representatives majorities, as in the 65th Congress) in 15 of the 36 Congresses elected, although only in five of these did they form the majority in the United States Senate.

The Party was split between the "Bourbon Democrats", representing Eastern business interests, and the agrarian elements comprising poor farmers in the South and West. The agrarian element, marching behind the slogan of "free silver" (i.e. controlling monetary inflation), captured the Party in 1896, and nominated the "Great Commoner", William Jennings Bryan of Nebraska in 1896, 1900, and 1908; --- the only man nominated but elected unsuccessfully for three conventions, he lost each time. Both Bryan and Wilson were leaders of the "Progressive Movement", 19001920. Starting with 32nd President Franklin D. Roosevelt (of New York) in 1932 of the "Great Depression", the Party dominated the "Fifth Party System", with its liberal/progressive policies and programs with the "New Deal" coalition to combat the emergency bank closings and the continuing financial depression since the famous "Wall Street Crash of 1929" and later going into the crises leading up to the Second World War of 1939/1941 to 1945. The Democratis and the Democratic Party, finally lost the White House and control of the executive branch of government only after Roosevelt's death in April 1945 near the end of the War, and after the continuing post-war administration of FDR's third Vice President of the United States, the Harry S Truman, former Senator from Missouri, (for 1945 to 1952, elections of 1944 and the "stunner" of 1948). A new Republican Party president was only elected later in the following decade of the early 1950s with the losses by two-time nominee, the Governor of Illinois, Adlai Stevenson (grandson of the former Vice President with the same name of the 1890's) to the very popular war hero and commanding general in World War II, General Dwight D. Eisenhower (in 1952 and 1956).

With two brief interruptions since the "Great Depression", and World War II eras, the Democrats with unusually large majorities for over four decades, controlled the lower house of the United States Congress in the House of Representatives from 1930 until 1994, and the U.S. Senate for most of that same period, electing the Speaker of the House and the Representatives' majority leaders/committee chairs along with the upper house of the Senate's majority leaders and committee chairmen. Important Democratic progressive/liberal leaders included Presidents: 33rd - Harry S Truman, [of Missouri], (19451953), and 36th - Lyndon B. Johnson, [of Texas], (19631969), as well as the earlier Kennedy brothers of 35th President John F. Kennedy, [of Massachusetts], (19611963), Senators Robert F. Kennedy, of New York, and Senator Edward M. ("Teddy") Kennedy, of Massachusetts who carried the flag for modern American political liberalism. Since the Presidential Election of 1976, Democrats have won five out of the last ten presidential elections, winning in the presidential elections of 1976 (with 39th President Jimmy Carter of Georgia, 1976-1981), 1992 and 1996 (with 42nd President Bill Clinton of Arkansas, 1993-2001), and 2008 and 2012 (with 44th President Barack Obama of Illinois, 2009-incumbent).

The modern Democratic Party was formed in the 1830s from former factions of the Democratic-Republican Party, which had largely collapsed by 1824. It was built by Martin Van Buren with the purpose of gaining power without being tied down to principles or ideals in order to avoid the brewing Civil War over the institution of slavery. He rallied a cadre of politicians in every state behind war hero Andrew Jackson of Tennessee .[4]

The spirit of Jacksonian Democracy animated the party from the early 1830s to the 1850s, shaping the Second Party System, with the Whig Party the main opposition. After the disappearance of the Federalists after 1815, and the Era of Good Feelings (181624), there was a hiatus of weakly organized personal factions until about 182832, when the modern Democratic Party emerged along with its rival the Whigs. The new Democratic Party became a coalition of farmers, city-dwelling laborers, and Irish Catholics.[5]

Behind the party platforms, acceptance speeches of candidates, editorials, pamphlets and stump speeches, there was a widespread consensus of political values among Democrats. As Norton explains:

The Party was weakest in New England, but strong everywhere else and won most national elections thanks to strength in New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia (by far, the most populous states at the time), and the frontier. Democrats opposed elites and aristocrats, the Bank of the United States, and the whiggish modernizing programs that would build up industry at the expense of the yeoman or independent small farmer.[7]

From 1828 to 1848, banking and tariffs were the central domestic policy issues. Democrats strongly favored expansion to new farm lands, as typified by their expulsion of eastern American Indians and acquisition of vast amounts of new land in the West after 1846. The party favored the War with Mexico and opposed anti-immigrant nativism. Both Democrats and Whigs were divided on the issue of slavery. In the 1830s, the Locofocos in New York City were radically democratic, anti-monopoly, and were proponents of hard money and free trade.[8][9] Their chief spokesman was William Leggett. At this time labor unions were few; some were loosely affiliated with the party.[10]

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