| political party | an organization that recruits, nominates, and elects party members to office in order to control the government
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| platform | the formal statement of a party's principles and policy objectives
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| grassroots organizing | tasks that involve direct contact with voters or potential voters.
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| responsible party model | political scientists' view that a function of a party is to offer a clear choice to voters by establishing priorities or policy stances different from those of rival parties
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| party in the electorate | individuals who identify with or tend to support a party
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| party identifiers | individuals who identify themselves as a member of one party or the other
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| independent | a voter who does not belong to any organized political party; often used as a synonym for an unaffiliated voter
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| party organization | the formal party apparatus, including committees, party leaders, conventions, and workers
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| loyal opposition | a role that the party out of power plays, highlighting its objections to policies and priorities of the government in power
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| soft money loophole | Supreme Court interpretation of campaign finance law that enabled political parties to raise unlimited funds for party-building activities such as voter registration drives and get-out-the-vote (GOTV) efforts
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| party in government | the partisan identifications of elected leaders in local, county, state, and federal government
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| divided government | the situation that exists when Congress is controlled by one party and the presidency by the other
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| party system | the categorization of the number and competitiveness of political parties in a polity
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| realignment | a shift in party allegiances or electoral support
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| populism | a philosophy supporting the rights and empowerment of the masses as opposed to elites
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| spoils system | the practice of rewarding political supporters with jobs
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| political machine | big-city party organization that exerted control over many aspects of life and lavishly rewarded supporters
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| patronage | system in which a party leader rewarded political supporters with jobs or government contracts in exchange for their support of the party
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| New Deal | Franklin Roosevelt's broad social welfare program in which the government would bear the responsibility of providing a "safety net" to protect the most disadvantaged members of society
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| New Deal coalition | the group composed of southern Democrats, northern city dwellers, immigrants, the poor, Catholics, labor union members, blue-collar workers, African Americans, and women that elected FDR to the presidency four times
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| dealignment | the situation in which fewer voters support the two major political parties, instead identifying themselves as independent, or splitting their ticket between candidates from more than one party
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| ticket splitting | the situation in which voters vote for candidates from more than one party
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| candidate committees | organizations that candidates form to support their individual election
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| third party | a party organized as opposition or an alternative to the existing parties in a two-party system
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| winner-take-all | electoral system in which the candidate who receives the most votes wins that office, even if that total is not a majority.
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| proportional representation system | an electoral structure in which political parties win the number of parliamentary seats equal to the percentage of the vote the party receives
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| primary election | an election in which voters choose the party's candidates who will run in the later general election
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| candidate-centered campaign | a campaign in which an individual seeking election, rather than an entire party slate, is the focus
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| Tea Party movement | a grassroots, conservative protest movement that opposed recent government actions, including economic stimulus spending and health care reform
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