“One ought to remember that the history of mankind is a history of appeasement that didn’t work.” Dean Rusk (Former US Secretary of State)
The Democratic Party in the United States has historically functioned as a broad coalition, encompassing northern urban machines, southern conservatives, organized labor, civil rights advocates, and cosmopolitan professionals. The oldest active voter-based political party in the world being founded in 1828. Over the past three decades, however, the ideological center of gravity within that coalition has shifted in ways that have generated sustained intraparty tension. The center-left establishment associated with the presidencies of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama now competes for agenda-setting power with a progressive insurgency animated by Senator Bernie Sanders and the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA)-aligned membership of Congress. The documented trajectory of that realignment, from the “New Democrat” ascendancy of the 1990s through the primary challenges and platform fights of the present era is notable.
