37. The Political Puzzle                                      

Source:  The Representative (Minneapolis/St.Paul, MN), May 24, 1900

Middle-of-the-road and fusionist factionalism was not new to the third party movement in 1896.  Both the Greenback and Union Labor parties suffered from the same divisions.  But, the split beginning in 1896 was more severe than before.  Because Democrats constituted the political elite in the South, southern Populists saw them as the enemy.  In the West, however, Republicans dominated.  This made Democrats potential allies in western Populist eyes.  Thus, the fusionist/middle-of-the-roader conflict also manifested itself as a western/southern split within the People's Party.  This division broke the most successful of Populism's three electoral coalitions (westerners and southerners, labor and farmers, whites and blacks).  In 1900, mid-roaders met in Cincinnati and Fusionists in Sioux Falls.  The split essentially meant that a national third party no longer existed.

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