what was the common bond between both political parties in the 1800s
The Democratic Party is the oldest voter-based political party in the world and the oldest existing political party in the United States, tracing its heritage back to the anti-Federalists and the Jeffersonian Democratic-Republican Party of the 1790s. During the Second Party System (from 1832 to the mid-1850s) under Presidents Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren and James K. Polk, the Democrats usually bested the opposition Whig Party by narrow margins. Both parties worked hard to build grassroots organizations and maximize the turnout of voters, which often reached 80 percent or 90 percent. Both parties used patronage extensively to finance their operations, which included emerging big city political machines as well as national networks of newspapers. The Democratic Party was a proponent for slave-owners across the country, urban workers and caucasian immigrants.