The fact is that democracy requires not only the organization of political parties, but also a certain degree of mutual respect or at least tolerance. Whenever the followers of one political party persuade themselves that the future of the nation is not safe with the opposition in power, it becomes fairly certain that the nation’s future is not safe, no matter which party rules. For such political acrimony endangers the nation’s health more than any specific political policies.
–Reinhold Niebuhr, “Democracy and the Party Spirit,” from Love and Justice: Selections from the Shorter Writings of Reinhold Niebuhr
These words were originally published in 1954, but it’s hardly much of a stretch to apply them today. Niebuhr thought that “party spirit” in 1954 was more of a problem on the Right than on the Left–as President Eisenhower was trying to manage his party’s radical right flank, who were busy looking for Communists under every bed. And similarly today, there’s no shortage of rhetoric coming from the Right about America’s imminent descent into a socialist hellscape (see Sen. Ted Cruz’s recent speech announcing his presidential campaign, to take just one pertinent example). The main difference now seems to be that the radical right flank accounts for the vast majority of the G.O.P.
But then, I’m a Democrat, so I would say that, wouldn’t I?
A Thinking Reed 