milkis paper

While the reforms had the desired effect of lessening the administrative power of the president it did so by making political institutions more bureaucratic. There it failed to nurture civic culture and lead to an increase in the public's disenchantment with parties and the party system. .
             To better understand the decline of the party system one must first understand the development and the positive attributes of the early American party system. Party competition first emerged, when James Madison and Thomas Jefferson sought to create a political opposition to Alexander Hamilton, John Adams and the Federalists. Madison who originally had been the leading federalist in the country became the leader of a more antifederalist Jeffersonian Republican party who embraced parties and factions in order to protect and preserve the future of federalism and the separation of powers. He feared that Hamilton's view of the Constitution and the unitary system that he advocated would destroy the delicate balance of powers that Madison's understanding of government had envisioned. The Neutrality Proclamation in 1793, an act in which the Washington administration declared that the United States would enter no war, compelled Jefferson and Madison to take action. He claimed that according to the Constitution, the power to declare war is not in the hands of the President but in those of Congress. Madison argued that when confronted with the most important issues of sovereignty it is Congress duty to come to decisions because only in the legislature could the required debate and judgments take place that would allow for sufficient self-government. Thus, Madison's who originally argued against the formation of parties played a major role in developing the first major party, and helped in forming, "the tradition dedicated to local self-government, thus ensuring that federalism would be a central feature in the dynamic o American constitutional government.