Three's a Crowd: The Dynamic of Third Parties, Ross Perot, and Republican Resurgence

12. Afterword: The Dynamic of Third Parties and the Future of the Perot Constituency

XII Afterword THE DYNAMIC OF THIRD PARTIES AND THE FUTURE OF THE PEROT CONSTITUENCY THROUGHOUT THIS BOOK, WE have argued that the Perot constituency played a pivotal role in U.S. national politics in the elections after Perot first ran for president in 1992.The "dynamic of third parties" describes the process whereby Perot's or any third-party movement might have a lasting impact on the electoral system: the third-party candidate emerges to attract a significant electoral constituency animated by distinct issue concerns; one or both of the major parties subsequently bids for the third party's constituency based on the issues that motivated the movement in the first place; and members of the third party disproportionately shift their support to the major party that makes the stronger bid.As a result ofthis shift in support, the third-party movement itselfloses steam and disappears, and the party making the successful bid is changed to the extent that the bid entails policy commitments that are different from its long-standing issue and policy positions. In the years following the emergence of the 1992 Perot movement, the Republicans made a successful bid with two important consequences . First, the Republican Party increased its vote share by adding a significant portion of the Perot constituency that had not supported the Republicans prior to 1992.As a result ofattracting former Perot supporters as newcomers to its ranks, the Republican Party was able to win and 241 Lj.2 THREE'S A CROWD hold control of Congress for the first time since the 1952 elections and to win the presidency in 2000. In short, the Republican bid helped produce a "resurgence" in that party's fortunes. The second consequence of the party's bid was that it drew into the GOP a cohort of activists and voters committed to the Perot issue agenda, especially issues related to reform, balancing the federal budget, and "economic nationalism." What might these developments imply for the years since we completed the fIrst edition of Three's a Crowd? In this afterword, we examine the extent to which the Perot constituency remained intact through the 2004 election, and we speculate about how changes in the Republican Party since the election of President George W Bush in 2000 might affect the continued involvement of Perot supporters in Republican campaigns. We argue that by 2004 the Bush record was at considerable odds with the Perot agenda, effectively amounting to a Republican disavowal of its bid for the Perot constituency in the Contract with America and elsewhere during the 1990S. Therefore, to the extent that Perot supporters remained committed to the issues that originally motivated them to commit to Perot and to switch their support to Republican candidates in the elections after 1992, two questions arise: Did former Perot supporters respond by withdrawing their backing for [~epublicans, and what might their response suggest for the fiJture? To address these questions, we rely on a continuing survey of former Perot backers that we conducted immediately after the 2004 election.' CONTINUITY IN THE PEROT CONSTITUENCY A third-party constituency, such as Perot's, can remain pivotal in American national c1ectiom if its former supporters continue to hold the issue positions that originally motivated them. In the case of Perot's backers, these issue commitlllents were the basis of the Republican bid and explained their 'vvillingness to move to the GOP (see chap. 7). An implication , however, is that the third-party supporters can remain pivotal even I. The data we report are based Oil samples of Reform and major-party contributors begun ill 1996 (see app. A). Afterword 243 2 ,-------------------------------------------------, '" .. ,. '" !!l e ~ 1.5 ,g 0.5 t: o D. D. ,. Ul C .. ~ 0 -0.5 1.63 0.62 -0.55 1996 0.57 -0.36 2000 1.67 0.36 -0.01 0 1.00 Core Republicans 0 2.00 Democrats 11 3.00 Reformers 1.30 . 4.00 Reformers Mobilized by GOP 2004 -1 L-____________________________________________________~ Fig. 12.1. Mean position on Perot issues for core Republicans, Democrats, Reformers, and Reformers mobilized by the Republican Party, 1996-2004 after they have responded to the bid of one of the major parties, if they are also willing to withdraw their support if the bid is renounced. To assess their reaction to Bush's disavowal ofthe Perot agenda, the first step is to determine whether the Perot constituency maintained its commitment...