2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: Is it really a good idea to get rid of closed primaries? [View all]George II
(67,782 posts)....hopefully be competitive.
Since there are that many independents, they are free to form a club and go through the process that we just completed in the Democratic Party.
But, if you were to talk to that 42%, I think you'd find that if they organized into loose "factions", the outcome might be four or five groups, each lower than either of the levels of membership of the current two major parties.
That happens on the state level. I know that when I lived in New York State there were actually four viable parties - the Democratic Party, the republican party, and also the Conservative and Liberal Parties. In fact, back in the 1960s and 1970s both of the "minor" parties were very instrumental in New York State politics.
In 1969 New York City Mayor John Lindsay lost the republican primary, so he entered the general election as a member of the Liberal Party, and was re-elected.
When Mario Cuomo ran for Mayer in the 1970s, he lost the primary to Ed Koch, so ran as a member of the Liberal Party and barely got beaten.
In 1970, James Buckley didn't get the republican nomination, so he ran under the Conservative Party, and was elected Senator.
So it can happen, and not in just small states. At the time I believe New York had the largest electorate, or was close to #1, and as you can see at least three candidates from two so-called "minor" parties had good showings in the general election - two were elected and one barely lost.