Party Strength in Congress
Historians have used statistical techniques to estimate the party breakdown in Congress. Many Congressmen were hard to classify in the first few years, but after 1796 there was less uncertainty.
| Election Year | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| House | 1788 | 1790 | 1792 | 1794 | 1796 | 1798 | 1800 | 1802 | 1804 | 1806 |
| Federalist | 37 | 39 | 51 | 47 | 57 | 60 | 38 | 39 | 25 | 24 |
| Democratic-Republican | 28 | 30 | 54 | 59 | 49 | 46 | 65 | 103 | 116 | 118 |
| Percentage Democratic-Republican | 43% | 43% | 51% | 56% | 46% | 43% | 63% | 73% | 82% | 83% |
| Senate | 1788 | 1790 | 1792 | 1794 | 1796 | 1798 | 1800 | 1802 | 1804 | 1806 |
| Federalist | 18 | 16 | 16 | 21 | 22 | 22 | 15 | 9 | 7 | 6 |
| Democratic-Republican | 8 | 13 | 14 | 11 | 10 | 10 | 17 | 25 | 17 | 28 |
| Percentage Democratic-Republican | 31% | 45% | 47% | 34% | 31% | 31% | 53% | 74% | 71% | 82% |
- Source: Kenneth C. Martis, The Historical Atlas of Political Parties in the United States Congress, 1789-1989 (1989). The numbers are estimates.
The affiliation of many Congress-men in the earliest years is an assignment by later historians; these were slowly coalescing groups with initially considerable independent thinking and voting; Cunningham noted that only about a quarter of the House of Representatives, up till 1794, voted with Madison as much as two-thirds of the time, and another quarter against him two-thirds of the time, leaving almost half as fairly independent. Albert Gallatin recalled only two caucuses on legislative policy between 1795 and 1801, one over appropriations for Jay's Treaty, the other over the Quasi-War, and in neither case did the party decide to vote unanimously.
Read more about this topic: Democratic-Republican Party
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