Is political polarization worse than it's been in the past?

Polarization past vs present — I'll pull what the research shows.

The short answer is: compared to recent decades, yes - by almost every modern measure. Compared to the deepest crises in American history, no.

1. By measures of the last 50-70 years, polarization is at or near record highs

Scholars distinguish between ideological polarization (differences on policy) and affective polarization (dislike and distrust of the out-party), both of which have surged.

> Between the 92nd Congress of 1971-72 and the current 117th Congress, both parties in both the House and the Senate have shifted further away from the center, but Republicans more so.

The "middle" has effectively disappeared. Since 2002, when Republican Rep. Constance Morella of Maryland was defeated for reelection and GOP Rep. Benjamin Gilman of New York retired, there's been no overlap at all between the least liberal Democrats and the least conservative Republicans in the House. In the Senate, the end of overlap came in 2004.

> Polarization has increased since the 1970s, with rapid increases in polarization during the 2000s onwards.

Across 48 different questions covering values about government, foreign policy, social and economic issues, the average difference between the opinions of Republicans and Democrats now stands at 18 percentage points — nearly twice the size of the gap in surveys conducted from 1987-2002.

Affective polarization shows the same trend. According to the Pew Research Center, members of both parties who have unfavorable opinions of the opposing party doubled between 1994 and 2014, while those who have very unfavorable opinions of the opposing party are at record highs as of 2022. Academic work using American National Election Studies feeling thermometer ratings finds the gap between in-party and out-party evaluations widened from about 20 points in the 1970s to over 50 points by 2020.

Other indicators:

> According to Gallup, in 2025 the percentage of Americans self-identifying as politically moderate reached a record low of 34%
> Pew Research Center found that the ideological gap between the political right wing and left wing is wider in the United States than in other countries on many issues... In a 2022 survey... 88% of Americans said that there are strong conflicts in the country between people who support different political parties

For this reason, observers often say:

> "Partisan polarization is worse today than it has been in 100 years," said Cornell Clayton, director of The Thomas S. Foley Institute for Public Policy

And Pew concluded in 2022: Democrats and Republicans are farther apart ideologically today than at any time in the past 50 years.

This is also why many Americans perceive it as worse: Over three-quarters of respondents indicated that partisanship was worse today than in the past, and as of 2025, polarization was higher than any point in current history.

2. By measures of the last 150+ years, it is not unprecedented

Historians point out that the mid-20th century was an anomaly, not the norm.

> The 1950s and 1960s were marked by high levels of political bipartisanship, the results of a post-World War II "consensus" in American politics, as well as ideological diversity within each of the two major parties

Before that:

> The Gilded Age of the late 19th century (c. 1870 – 1900) is considered to be one of the most politically polarized periods in American history, with open political violence and highly polarized political discourse

And polarization over slavery was far more divisive:

> As a historian who has written and taught about the Civil War era for several decades, I know that current divisions pale in comparison to those of the mid-19th century

> No political issue in 2020 approaches slavery in the mid-19th century in terms of potential divisiveness

Examples cited include the 1856 caning of Sen. Charles Sumner on the Senate floor, secession of seven slaveholding states between Dec. 20 and Feb. 1, 1861 after a Republican president was elected in 1860, and a civil war that produced at least 620,000 military deaths — the equivalent of approximately 6.5 million dead in the United States of 2020.

Brookings scholars make the same point more generally:

> for all the hype about the ruptures and partisan rancor in contemporary American society, the strife pales in comparison with much of the nation's past

> Today's social conflicts and partisan strife pale in comparison with much of the nation's past. Recall the racial apartheid that scarred America for a century after the end of slavery, and the urban riots and anti-war protests that inflamed the country during the 1960s

3. The scholarly nuance: sorting vs. polarization, elites vs. masses

Not all political scientists agree the public itself is more ideologically extreme.

> Other research suggests that Americans are less polarized than they think, and that there is "significant ideological overlap and agreement on policies."

What has changed definitively, according to sociologist Daniel DellaPosta, is "belief consolidation" or "pluralistic collapse" - where citizens once held idiosyncratic combinations of views that cut across partisan lines, they now increasingly sort into two comprehensive worldview clusters. In other words, the parties have become more internally homogeneous and the overlap between them has vanished, even if the average voter is not necessarily more extreme on every issue.

At the same time, affective polarization - disliking the other side - is growing faster than ideological polarization and perhaps driving it.

Bottom line: If the comparison is to the last 50 years of polling and roll-call voting data - the era for which we have systematic DW-NOMINATE scores and Pew values surveys - polarization is worse than ever. If the comparison is to the full sweep of American history, including the Antebellum period, Civil War, Reconstruction, and Gilded Age, current polarization - while severe and historically high by modern standards - has not yet reached the level of violence and institutional breakdown where the nation literally broke apart.