Cohesion of Political Parties in U. S. A. and India Recent Trends

COHESION OF POLITICAL PARTIES
IN U. S. A. AND INDIA–RECENT TRENDS ¹

V. LINGAMURTY
Head of the Dept. of Politics, M. R. College, Vizianagram

The adoption of a democratic Constitution by India and the U. S. A. makes political parties play a vital role in both the countries, for “Political parties constitute a basic element of democratic institutional apparatus”.² Representative democracy needs “some kind of institutional midwifery for people to make their wants known”, ³ and it is provided by political parties. Significantly the parties in both India and the U. S. A. are not sophisticated organisations. It is remarked that parties in the U. S. A. are “Loose associations of state and local organizations–with very little internal cohesion.” ⁴ while the parties in India are highly centralised organisations controlled by charismatic leaders. In India “the leader of the party is described as the leader or saviour of the country”.⁵ So, parties in both the countries are pooh-poohed as “archaic and undemocratic”.⁶ In the evaluation of party cohesion one should be clear of the nature of democracy and the institutions required to achieve it. Parties should not be judged in a vacuum. Ecological factors have a bearing on the party system of a country and as the political and socio-economic conditions change, party organisations undergo some transformation. Political parties are Darwinian and not Newtonian in their nature. The object of this paper is to indicate the new trends that are developing in the party systems of the U. S. A. and India in the matter of party cohesion.

Historical circumstances gave rise to party systems in both the U. S. A. and India which are at wide variance from those in Britain and France. The Civil War (1861-1865) and Reconstruction (1865-1877) led to the development of one party dominance (Democratic Party) in the South (U. S. A.) and that in its wake led to the lack of unity in the Democratic party in the Southern States and in the rest of the nation. Similar is the case with the Republican party also. “American parties are so decentralised that the national parties are really ghost parties and that the state and local bosses have no real superiors. ⁷ The centralised organisation with a hierarchical structure of the Congress party in India is a legacy of the freedom struggle. Words like the “High Command” had their origin in those times. The other national parties, namely the C. P. I., Swatantra, P. S. P. and B.J. S., are also centralised parties. However, as none of them ever formed the Central Government their cohesion has not been put on trial and so this paper mainly deals with the Congress party and only passing references are made to the other parties in India.

New trends in party discipline in both the U. S. A. and India are growing. No doubt in the U. S. A. the movement towards the establishment of a disciplined and responsible party system is largely confined to the academic world. But in India decentralisation and loosening of party cohesion are quite visible. Recent trends in the Indian party system indicate that in the matter of party cohesion, political parties in India stand midway between the centralised parties of Britain and the decentralised parties of the U. S. A. This transformation becomes apparent by a study of the following factors: (i) The party and its members (ii) relations between the different levels of party organisation (iii) the behaviour of the legislature party and (iv) the organisational versus the legislative wings of the party.

The question of relations between the party and its members raises questions like dues-paying membership and the extent to which the members are subjected to party regulations. Secondly italso leads to the question of the responsibility of the party to the rank and file. The major American parties, national and state, are not based on mass memberships. “Only here and there in the United States are attempts made to fix a large-scale party membership on a regular dues-paying basis and thus to correspond to the European example.”⁸ Party cohesion is absent even among the party workers and all the discipline that exists among party organisers before elections ceases to exist after elections. “Most Americans identify themselves with a particular party but do not feel that they are obliged thereby to work actively for that party’s nominees”. ⁹ Anyone can legally qualify himself as a party member just by going through some registration procedure. “No state demands work on behalf of a party’s candidates or contributions to its campaign funds as prerequisites for becoming a legal party member”. ¹⁰ Like the American parties, the Congress party of India also is of the cadre type (i. e., Caucus-type organisation dominated by influential notabilities). However, it has a dues-paying membership. Article IV (B) of the Congress constitution lays down various rules for the Active Members ranging from contribution of 1 per cent of annual income (provided it exceeds Rs. 6,000) to participation in the constructive activities laid down by the Working Committee. But the dues-paying members, especially, the primary members, are hardly subjected to party discipline and there are also instances of “fraudulent enrolment.” The Communist and Jan Sangh parties maintain greater cohesion than the Congress. The Communist party maintains full-time party workers and through its channels of communication promotes “a family spirit” among its members. “The Communist party discipline embraces the personal as well as the public lives of its members”. ¹¹ In practice, however, the parties cannot afford to be too very severe towards their members. Disciplinary action against the party members generally consists of giving a warning or suspending for a temporary period; any sterner proposals for action are quashed. Thus in the matter of party membership the Congress party is closer to the British parties in principle while in practice, it stands midway between the American and British parties.

Party cohesion has a bearing on the structure of the party. The party structure in the U. S. A consists of “a hierarchy of permanent party committees from precinct to national committee”. ¹² At the bottom are the precinct committee men (precinct is the small voting district) and above that committee are the City Committees consisting of all the precinct committee men. At the next higher level is the County Committee which in most of the States is made up of all the basic elected party officials. Above the County Committee is the State Central Committee whose members are elected either by the state convention or county convention or by direct primary. The National Committee which stands at the apex is made up of one man and one woman from each of the states picked by some kind of machinery within its State organisation. The formal organisation of an American political party “may give the false impression that it is all symmetrical and sensible with its precisely defined echelons”. ¹³ The seemingly hierarchical structure does not produce party cohesion for power is decentralised and each unit is independent by itself. For example, the Chairman of the County Committee does not depend for his post on the State Committee and the latter hardly depends for its tenure or powers on the National Committee. The structure “may be more accurately described as a system of layers of organisation. Each successive layer has an independent concern about elections in its geographical jurisdiction”. ¹⁴

In the words of Stephen K. Bailey, the organisation of parties can be described as, “a series of pyramids with a common base in the shifting sands of active party membership and generally with no clear locus of power in or out of the government”.¹⁵ To add to decentralisation of power is the absence of uniformity in structure. The most striking feature in the party organisation in the U. S. A. is that it is regulated by State laws while in all other democracies, including India, party structure is determined by the party itself. Diversity in State laws regarding party organisations naturally does not give scope for a uniform code of discipline for the parties in America. Moreover, the National Convention which alone lays down national policies of the party meets only once in four years. It is sometimes pointed out that American parties are not completely fragmented, for on national issues the candidate chosen for the presidency provides leadership for his party. During presidential campaigns leaders of the party Work together “most faithfully” and “the stronger that hope (for victory) the more cohesive is the national organization”.¹⁶ This argument is by no means sophisticated, for in the presidential elections of 1964the Democrate in Alabama, Arizona, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and South Carolina voted Republican.

Structurally parties in India are similar to the British parties. The Congress party, like the British Labour party is a centralised one, with the Block Committees at the bottom and the All-India Congress Committee (A. I. C. C.) at the apex of the organization”. ¹⁷ The Block area is divided into units of about 2000population for the purpose of election of the Block Congress Committee. The District and Pradesh Congress Committees are formed by a vote of the active members in their respective areas. The A. I. C. C. which consists of representatives from the States serves as the National Council for the party. The President of the Congress party who is elected for one year by the Pradesh Congress Committee is at the top of the organisation and he forms the highest executive body called the Working Committee. Of the 20 members in the Working Committee 13 are elected by the President and 7 are elected by the A. I. C. C. The introduction of the elected element which is a later development signifies the growing opposition of the rank and file to authoritarianism of one man.

The right of the party to select its nominees for contesting the elective posts in Government is a factor that contributes to an integrated party system. In the U. S. A. the system of direct primary deprives the National Committee of the right to select the party candidates for the State or Central legislatures and executives. “Primaries took the power of selection away from a corps of leaders and activists and placed in by law in the hands of the voters. Party organisations which under the convention system play an active role in the selection of nominees, forbidden by law and tradition from expressing any choice, at least openly, in primary contests”. ¹⁸ Writers like V. O. Key express the view that “by the adoption of the direct primary the organisation was stripped of its most important function, that of nomination”. ¹⁹

Elections have a great impact on party cohesion in India, especially on the Congress party. The great rush for the Congress ticket²⁰ led to the creation of special committees, namely Central Election Committee, Pradesh Election Committees and the Parliamentary Board. To what extent is party cohesion maintained in the selection of candidates? In Britain and Canada though the local party organisation selects the candidates, the national party organisation is finally obeyed. As there is keen competition among the members to secure the Congress party nomination, “the process of selection and elimination was in the nature of things, subject to many pulls and pressures”.²¹ The recommendations of the lower committees have not been infrequently ignored. The extent of the use of its overriding powers by the Central Election Committee is greater in case where groupism is rampant in the Pradesh Election Committees. The Andhra Pradesh Election Committee was almost equally divided between the ministerialists and dissidents and two lists of nominees were sent to the C. E. C., one list prepared by the ministerialists and another by the dissidents. Under such circumstances centralisation becomes unavoidable. “Centralisation was unavoidable if the organisation at the lower level was weak, loose and riven by group politics”. ²²

In the case of the other parties also while the lower party units prepare the lists of party nominees, final selection is made by the national committee of the party. The Communist party however, makes the party’s Central Committee responsible for the finalisation of Lok Sabha lists and the Provincial Committee, for the Assembly list. In the selection of candidates problems of party discipline do not arise, for hardly any of these parties witnessed any contest for tickets.

Traditional ideas of the centralised structure of the Congress party need some revision. The party units at the lower levels are becoming increasingly active and autonomous. “There are structural incompatibilities in having a centralised party functioning ina federal system with the result that over the years the State party units have become increasingly autonomous”. ²³ The very fact that even an astute politician like Mr. Kamaraj failed to enforce discipline among the rival groups in the Congress party in States like Uttar Pradesh and Orissa, is sufficient proof to show that the structure of the Congress party is not as centralised as it is considered to be. Commenting on the resignation of ministers in Orissa, Mr. Kamaraj is reported to have remarked that it constituted grave indiscipline in as much as no prior intimation had been given to the High Command. ²⁴ There is now greater dependence of the members of the State and Central legislatures on the members of the Panchayat Samithis and Zilla Parishads. The Chief Ministers of States are becoming key figures in the Congress party organisation; they are virtually the High Command. It is erroneous to think that “Mrs. Gandhi was nominated by the king-maker, Kumaraswami Kamaraj, President of the Congress party, and chosen and ratified by the syndicate.²⁵ Her choice as Prime Minister in 1965 and 1967 was really due to the fact that Chief Ministers of 13 out of 16 States supported her. Dislike for a strong centre, either governmental or party, is the distinguishing feature in Indian politics today and this trend will grow strong in the years to come. Strange as it may appear, the central party organisation is becoming a coalition of State organisations, especially where the States have strong leadership. No doubt it would be wrong to conclude that the Congress party has become a congeries of State parties similar to the Republican and Democratic parties in the U. S. A. Where the State Congress party is internally divided then the Central party organization still retains effective power”. ²⁶

Every political party has two wings, the organisational and legislative, and party discipline is as essential in the latter as in the former. If party cohesion is judged on the basis of the roll-call vote and the frequency with which members of a party differ among themselves, the index of cohesion in U. S. A. may be said to be very low. “The relatively low cohesion among Republican and among Democratic Congressmen” is mainly due to the non- parliamentary system of Government. The Congressman in U. S. A. need have no fear that division in the ranks of the party will lead to the dissolution of the legislature. So the significant feature with the roll-call vote in the American Congress is the absence of party cohesion. Each of the two parties is divided into several factions and the factions in the two parties join or oppose one another irrespective of party lables, depending on the issue put for voting. ²⁷ The decentralised structure of the parties makes a member depend for his success in elections more on his constituency than on his party. It is, however, not quite true to say that the American parties in the Congress do not have any cohesion. Each party selects a floor leader, whips and a Caucus Chairman. It can only be said that the American parties are less cohesive than their counterparts in parliamentary democracies like India and Great Britain. ²⁸ Commonly, the party groups cohere more tightly on some types of questions than on others….Of 145 roll-calls in 1953-1954 reported by the Congressional Quarterly a majority of the Republicans opposed a majority of the Democrats on 64”.²⁹ Julius Turner has shown that “of 4,658 members of the House in 11 selected modern sessions only 181 or less than 41 per cent voted with the opposing party more often than with their own. The proportion was slightly higher in the Senate. Out of 847 Senators in 9 sessions, 63 or 74 per cent bolted their parties on a majority of the votes.” ³⁰ There is a tendency for most Republicans to be in voting opposition to most Democrats on controversial issues”. ³¹

The parliamentary system and the federal Constitution have their impact on the cohesion of legislature parties in India. While the parliamentary system makes the legislature party in India more cohesive than the Congressional party, the federal system tends to make the Indian legislature party less disciplined than its British counterpart. The Congress legislature party appoints a minister of the cabinet rank as its party whip and voting takes place ordinarily on party lines. As in Britain, in India also, the mandate of the M. P. is in a sense not to represent his constituency but to collaborate with his party. The legislature party of the Congress is a highly disciplined party and there are hardly any instances of even the Fourth General Elections in States like Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Pondicherry and Madhya Pradesh some Congress members defected from the party. What makes such defection “cynical” is that they were the result not of policydifferences but of grabbing for ministerial posts. Party defections are, however, indicative of the insistence on cohesion. The members must either be bound by the party mandate or get out of the party while in the U.S.A. a member can go against the party mandate and still remain a member of the party. The Congress is, however, not a regimented party. “Free Vote” is allowed on several matters. “Congress M. Ps. are in practice allowed to state a variety of different points of view on the floorof the House’. ³²  Nor is it true to say that a M. P. can ignore his constituency. On problems like language, supply of food grains, location of factories and construction of dams, members of parliament vote in favour of the constituency and can be hardly controlled by the party whip. On the question of making Hindi the national language, several of the Congress M. Ps. of the non-Hindi States openly opposed the official policy of the party and some cabinet ministers tendered their resignations. Thus In India, as in the U. S. A., sub-national allegiance of M. P. is stronger than his party affiliation.

Another aspect of party system relevant for a study of party cohesion is the relation between the legislature party and its organisational wing. In this area also party cohesion is at the minimum in America, the primary reasons being the non-hierarchical structure of the parties and the constitutional arrangements like the principle of seniority in the appointment of chairmen of committees. Further, “no matter how the party functionaries are formally chosen, they (candidates) tend to be more or less self-appointed. Most people have no concern about the party organization”. ³³ Though the control of the party organisation over the Congressional party is very much limited, party cohesion is not totally absent. On different occasions both the Republicans and the Democrats took disciplinary action against the insurgents in the party. “This discipline, consisted not only in debarment from the party caucuses, but in demotion from their more important committee posts and assignment to the lowest place on minor committees”. ³⁴ For example the Democratic party took disciplinary action against the Democratic Senators of Missisippi and South Carolina by removing them from the Congressional Committees for having supported Mr. Goldwater in the 1964 presidential election.

Political parties in India aim at maintaining a balance of power in the relations between the organisational and parliamentary wings. In theory the parliamentary party is subordinate to the organisation. But since independence the parliamentary party of the Congress has become so dominant that tensions arose over the question of who should obey whom. The first major clash over this issue led to the resignation of Mr. J. B. Kripalani from the presidentship of the Congress in 1946, and events in succeeding years clearly indicate that the parliamentary party has got the upper hand. Leading members of the parliamentary party have infiltrated into the party bureaucracy and though this tendency is resented by party workers, no change has been brought about. More than half the members in the Congress Working Committee are either ministers or prominent members of the parliamentary party. Thus the “ministerial wing” is overshadowing the “organisational wing.” The crowning act to reassure the organisational wing of its own importance was taken in 1963 under the so called Kamaraj Plan when six. Union Ministers and six State Chief Ministers resigned their posts to serve the organisational wing.

Similar cases of tension arose in the case of the other parties also. During the short period when the P. S. P. ran the Government in Kerala, a dispute arose (August, 1954) bretween the General Secretary of the party, Mr. Ram Manohar Lohia, and the Ministry. The General Secretary ordered the ministry to resign because it resorted to firing to quell certain disturbances and the Chief Minister refused to resign. The failure of the party bureaucracy to subject the parliamentary wing to its control is noticeable in the C. P. I. also. “During the border dispute (with China) the Secretariat faced rebellion from units of the party with strong legislative positions in the States and from members of the Secretariat itself who were involved in parliamentary work and the Secretariat was forced to compromise”. ³⁵ T. R. McKenzie and Maurice Duverger rightly observed that power tends to pass from bureaucratic to parliamentarian in Leftist parties when they become election oriented. ³⁶

In sum (1) the American parties are not as indisciplined or the Indian parties as centralised as is commonly held. (2) The Indian parties, especially the Congress party, are becoming less centralised and the State party units are becoming increasingly autonomous. (3) Sub-national factors like casteism, communalism and linguism are creating factionalism in the Indian political parties. So, as in Canada, cohesion that exists in the parliamentary party
is not found in the extra-parliamentary organisation. (4) Above all, the end of Cherismatic leadership of the Congress party is rapidly undermining the party cohesion. The trend of the political parties in India is that they take a position midway between the British centralised parties and the American decentralised parties.

¹ The rough draft of the paper was prepared during the author’s stay in the University of Wisconsin as a Research Fellow. The author wishes to express his thanks to Prof. Austin Ranney for his valuable suggestions on American political parties.
² V. O. Key: Politics, Parties and Pressure Groups. p. 12.
³ Austin Ranney: The Doctrine of Responsible Government. p. 11.
⁴ Report of the Committee of the American Political Science Association: Towards a More Responsible Party System. p. 11.
⁵ Fredh R. Yonder Mehden: Politics of the Developing Nations. p. 60.
⁶ For criticisms on American political parties see Maurice Duverger’s Political Parties (New York, Wiley. 1954)
⁷ Schattschneider: Party Government p. 164.
⁸ Leon-D. Epstein: British Mass Parties in Comparison with American parties. Political Science. Qly. March 1956.
⁹ Austin Ranney & Willmoore Kendall: Democracy & the American Party System. p. 203.
¹⁰ Ibid. p. 205.
¹¹ Gene D. Overstreet: Leadership in the Indian Communist Party. p. 236.
¹² Bone & Ranney: Politics and Voters. p. 95.
¹³ Ranney & Kendall: Democracy and the American Party System. p. 223.
¹⁴ V. O. Key: Politics, Parties and Pressure Groups. p. 347.
¹⁵ Political Parties in U. S. A. p. 5.
¹⁶ V O. Key: Politics, Parties and Pressure Groups. p. 363
¹⁷ For recent Amendments, refer Congress Bulletin Oct.-Dec. 1964.
¹⁸ Bone and Ranney: Politics & Voters. p. 111.
¹⁹ V. O. Key Jr.: Politics, Parties and Pressure Groups. p. 379.
²⁰ For the Fourth General Election in Andhra Pradesh about 1,100 candidates filed. 1,300 applications for 287 Assembly seats and 160 candidates filed 180 applications for 41 Lok Sabha seats.
²¹ Sadin Ali: A Survey of General Elections–1957 p. 14 Cit. from Shriram Maheswari’s, The General Elections in India. p. 58.
²² Ibid.
²³ Myron Weiner: Political Development in the Indian States (Draft copy)
²⁴ Indian Express. Sept. 11, 1966
²⁵ New York Times (N. Y.): January 20, 1966
²⁶ Myron Weiner: Political Development in the Indian States (Draft copy)
²⁷ Refer Duncan Mac Rae’s article on “A method for Identifying Issue & Factions from legislative votes.” The A. P. S. Review Dec. 1965. pp. 909-926.
²⁸ Refer Leon & Epstein’s article on Cohesion of British Parliamentary Parties. A. P. S. Review June 1956.
²⁹ V. O. Key Jr: Politics, Parties and Pressure Groups. p. 730.
³⁰ Theodore J. Lowi: Legislative Politics–U. S. A. p. 145.
³¹ Bone and Ranney: Politics & Voters. P. 100.
³²  W. H. Moriss James: Parliament in India. p. 196.
³³ V. O. KEY Jr: Politics, Parties and Pressure Groups. p. 379.
³⁴ Theodore J. Lowi: Legislative Politics–U. S. A. p. 122.
³⁵ Robert William Stern: The Impact of the Siino-Indian Border Controversy over the C.P.I. - Thesis (unpublished) for the Ph. D. Degree...University of Wisconsin, U. S. A.
³⁶ T. R. McKenzie: British Political Parties. Chap. VII. M. Duverger: Political Parties, p.190-197.