Martin Van Buren:His Political Party Thought And Activities

Martin Van Buren was an important party activist during the first half of the nineteenth century in the United States. He started his political career when he begun to participate in party activities and ended it with his retirement from party politics. While engaging in his party practices, Van Buren constantly reflected on the attributes and functions, the organizational principles of political parties and thought deeply of the positions and influences of the opposition parties. The results of such thinking activities constituted the main contents of his political party thought. As a faithful disciple of Jeffersonism, Van Buren’s political party thought inherited directly from Jefferson’s ideas of political parties. To a certain extent, it is Van Buren’s organizational principles of political parties and his thought of legitimate opposition that reflected some innovations on Jefferson’s political party thoughtVan Buren’s perception of political party attributes mainly embodied his inheritance from Thomas Jefferson on political party thought. Like Thomas Jefferson, he also believed in the rationality of the existence of political parties, because they would always exist in a free society. Van Buren’s thought of the inevitability of political parties served as a convincing refutation to Dewitt Clinton’s antipartyism.Van Buren’s recognition of the positive effects of political parties firstly embodied his innovation on Thomas Jefferson’s political party thought. He believed that political parties could promote the public welfare. Jefferson’s early opposition to the existence of political parties and his appeal for their reconciliation in his presidency reflected his suspicions about the negative influence of political parties. Thus, his writings and statements lacked systematic descriptions of the active role of political parties. In the early nineteenth century, the Albany Regency led by Martin Van Buren engaged in public party activities through the spoils system, party newspapers and the caucus system out of its recognition of the positive effects of political parties and gradually established a dominant position in the political arena of New York while fighting with Dewitt Clinton.Van Buren’s emphasis on the importance of party construction also embodied his innovation on Thomas Jefferson’s political party thought. His organizational principles of political parties included the principle of democracy and the principle of discipline. The principle of democracy is a decision-making mechanism of political parties which can enhance the prestigious strength of their resolutions. The principle of discipline is a constraint mechanism for the members of political parties which requires them to maintain their party identities and to comply with the collective resolutions of political parties so as to enhance the executive force of their resolutions. Van Buren used the principle of discipline as a tool to reconcile the conflicts and enhance the political identities among different political forces in the formation of the Democratic Party. The majority rule accounted for Van Buren’s support for the National Convention System which took the majority rule as a voting mechanism. Therefore, this support reflected Van Buren’s high respect for the principle of democracy.Van Buren’s recognition of legitimate opposition also embodied his innovation on Thomas Jefferson’s political party thought. Jefferson’s writings and statements lacked systematic descriptions of the legitimate opposition. While protesting James Monroe’s "Fusion Policy", Van Buren highly recognized the positive role of the opposition parties and gradually accepted the legitimate opposition. The split in the Democratic Party in the mid-nineteenth century impeled Van Buren to participate in the making of the Free Soil Party, which provided an opportunity for the practice of his legitimate opposition principle.Martin Van Buren was the eighth president of the United States and a crucial participant in Jacksonian Democracy whose political party thought and activities had an important impact on party realignments and changes of party thoughts in the second half of the nineteenth century. Therefore, the study of his political party thought and activities will help us examine more carefully the development history of American political parties and the changes of political party thoughts during the nineteenth century. This study will also help to provide an in-depth look at the operation process of modern American party system and certain reference for the construction of the Chinese ruling party...