Party Dysfunction Gave America Trump and Clinton

During Tuesday's WEEKLY STANDARD podcast, I made a point that requires some amplification. The polls consistently show that the vast majority of voters—about 130 million in total—do not like either Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton, who were selected by just over 30 million people. There must be something wrong with our system of government when the people have two candidates foisted upon them by less than 25 percent of the whole.

At first blush, the answer is simple: That's democracy, so what? But upon closer inspection, things are substantially more complicated. "Democracy" is not simply a matter of letting the people decide. There is also a process to determine how the votes are counted, as well as who will be deemed a serious candidate, and who will not. Yes, voters have the power to choose in a democracy, but before they have exercised that power, a whole host of other actors have exercised their own authority, determining how the choice itself will be structured.

In our system of government, this "pre-democratic" power has long belonged to the parties. Indeed, it still does, more or less. And if voters are really dissatisfied with the choices they've been handed, they should blame the parties—and start demanding party reform.

It may seem peculiar to even discuss the idea of party reform. The parties, after all, are different than tax policy or Medicare. They don't "belong" to the government. They are private organizations, so why should we consider reforming them? While the parties are private entities—and thus outside direct government oversight—they still perform vital civic functions. So while we can't use the state to fix the parties, we should still try to fix them, by ourselves.

Indeed, the parties are the hinge of our system of government. Consider: Why is it that Americans use a representative system of government rather than a direct democracy? Part of the answer has to do with practicalities—it is simply too hard to corral everybody in one place to make a decision—but the Founding Fathers explicitly rejected the principle of vox populi, vox dei. They doubted the capacity of the people to rule themselves without adulteration. They were not "populists."