On Realignment

Inflection points can be hard to notice when they're happening

Photo by Austin Chan on Unsplash

I am very proud of our party tonight. This convention has shown to all America a party united, with positive programs for solving the nation's problems; a party ready to build a new consensus with all those across the land who share a community of values embodied in these words: family, work, neighborhood, peace and freedom.

When Ronald Reagan spoke these words at the 1980 Republican convention in Detroit, he was addressing a country that was open to a new direction after decades of war, unrest, and scandal, and during a period of double-digit inflation, high unemployment, and long gas lines. The incumbent president, Jimmy Carter, also sensed the country was ready for change, but his attempt to lead there fell flat, leaving an opening for his challenger.

Still, the race was close.

Going into Labor Day, Carter and Reagan were neck-and-neck, with independent candidate John Anderson claiming 14% of the vote. But as Election Day approached, Anderson’s support collapsed while Carter’s didn’t budge. What looked to be a nail biter turned into a ten-point Reagan victory and an Electoral College rout, ushering in what we would later call the Reagan Revolution.

At the time, it would have been speculative to say that Reagan’s conquest of his party would herald a lasting change in our politics. The 1980 results were as easily attributed to Carter’s failures as to Reagan’s vision.

Reagan in 1980 was regarded as an extreme figure from the right wing of his party who was out of step with the center-left politics that had been winning elections since 1932. He had more in common with Barry Goldwater—who was demolished in the 1964 election—than Richard Nixon, who had won in a landslide eight years earlier on a platform to the left of Reagan’s before being forced to resign in disgrace during Watergate.

In fact, Reagan floated the idea of a “co-presidency” with former president Gerald Ford to appease centrists in his party as he considered his options for a running mate.

Reagan ultimately rejected that idea, and instead of merging with the moderates he ended up dominating them and pointing his party in a new conservative direction.

In hindsight, the maneuvering at that convention in Detroit paved the way for a rightward sea change that would result in three consecutive Republican landslide elections and hamstring the liberal inclinations of the next two Democratic presidents. We just couldn’t see or imagine it at the time.

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There has not been a political realignment since. Until possibly now.

Re-read the words Reagan spoke to his convention and compare them to the messaging we heard in Chicago. The similarities jump out at you.

Last week, Democrats were able to show “to all America” what Reagan once called a party united.

Democrats are the party with “positive programs for solving the nation’s problems.”

Democrats, through the testimonials of Republicans and independents who appeared at their convention, are a party ready “to build a new consensus with all those across the land who share a community of values.”

Democrats spoke to the value of family. The value of work. The value of neighborhood. The value of peace and freedom.

And Republicans? They assembled in Milwaukee last month as a rump party devoted to a single leader, hemorrhaging one-time supporters no longer willing to sacrifice their values at the alter of a con man.

They offer no programs for solving the nation’s problems, but are prepared to move the country backward via the deeply unpopular and anti-democratic Project 2025.

They promise to disenfranchise and deport those who disagree with them.

In contrast to the energy emanating from Chicago, they look tired and spent.

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As I’m sure you’ve heard me say many times, one of the operating assumptions at this site is that we are in the midst of a slow-moving generational realignment that is causing the once-majority Republicans to consider exiting the democratic compact rather than recalibrate to win younger voters or accept being the loyal opposition in a new center-left alignment.

Because this realignment is generational it is also gradual. But there can be inflection points in the process that serve as clear markers for what the future will bring.

Like the Republican convention in 1980, the Democratic convention looks and feels like it may have been one of those moments.

But we have to let the election play out before we will know for sure.

Throughout American history, every realignment period has had its unique characteristics. The Reagan realignment was quick and decisive at the presidential level, but slow and uneven at the congressional level. The realignment prior to that, which culminated in the election of FDR and Democratic legislative supermajorities, was swift and comprehensive.

This moment has its dangers. It holds the potential for the collapse of democracy and the ascension of a reactionary politics that would stifle the will of the rising electorate that was so enthusiastically represented last week in Chicago.

But it also has its opportunities. Democrats did what successful parties do when faced with an inflection point. They came together. They rallied around a charismatic leader. They offered a way forward. They opened their doors to one-time adversaries. They revealed the depth of exhaustion people feel with the politics of anger and, like Reagan before them, feasted on the promise of joy.

We will know soon if they will emerge victorious and if their potential victory can withstand the inevitable efforts to set it aside by a reactionary faction determined not to let go of power.

But whatever happens in the coming weeks, we saw in Chicago that the country has already slipped from the grasp of the reactionaries. The appetite for change is there.

This is not an ordinary election. If the Harris/Walz ticket can continue to rise to the moment, the promise of something new and lasting awaits on the other side.