“The American People's National Party and its decline 1891-1896”

Abstract

The American National People's Party, or as it was later known as the Populist Party, is among the most prominent third parties, according to the dominant two-party system in the United States of America, which had a great public influence in the last decade of the nineteenth century, and is considered the basis for the subsequent populist movement until the present time. The research aims to briefly shed light on the founding of the party and its decline, to show the basis from which it developed, and to explain the difficulties that accompanied its founding and the political demands that it expressed in its political programs. Because the National People's Party abandoned many of its reform demands and focused on the issue of unlimited silver, its merger with the Democratic Party in the 1896 presidential elections led to the loss of the party's identity and independence. The loss of the Democratic Party in the elections had a major impact on the People's Party, after the return of thousands of its members to the ranks of the Democratic and Republican Party, the end of its role at the national level, and its decline.