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

Is polarization worse than ever? I'll gather historical data and research to compare today's divide to past eras.

Is political polarization worse than in the past? Answer is: Yes, compared to the recent past (last 30-50 years), but No, compared to the most divisive periods of U.S. history.

1. Polarization is at a modern high - worse than any point in the last 50 years

Multiple measures show the ideological distance between Democrats and Republicans is now larger than at any point in surveys or congressional voting records dating back to the 1970s-1990s.

The ideological "middle" has vanished: Five decades ago, 144 House Republicans were less conservative than the most conservative Democrat, and 52 House Democrats were less liberal than the most liberal Republican. Since 2002 there has been no overlap at all between the least liberal Democrats and the least conservative Republicans in the House, and since 2004 no overlap in the Senate. Duke researchers similarly concluded "We have not seen the current level of partisanship since the early 1900s".

2. But polarization is NOT worse than the most divisive historical periods

Historians emphasize that current divisions pale in comparison to the mid-19th century.

> 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. Between Abraham Lincoln’s election in November 1860 and the surrender of Robert E. Lee’s Confederate army at Appomattox in April 1865, the nation literally broke apart.

That period produced at least 620,000 military deaths and involved secession, the caning of Senator Charles Sumner on the Senate floor, and the assassination of President Lincoln - violence with no recent equivalent.

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

Other historians note the most divisive time was in the years leading up to the Civil War, when "differences were so profound representatives carried weapons into Congress", and that current affairs are comparable to the country's founding or Gilded Age, when two evenly matched parties traded "apocalyptic rhetoric and claims of election fraud, amid an atmosphere of widespread, even routine, political violence".

Nostalgia for the 1950s-60s as a golden age of civility also overlooks that it was an era when lynchings, beating of Freedom Riders, urban riots and political assassinations were frequent.

3. Why it feels worse than it is

Researchers note polarization can feel much worse than it is. "Political groups have moved further apart in recent years, but these divisions are still fuzzy, and Americans are not split into entirely opposing tribes when it comes to the issues". Much of the increase is in affective polarization - animosity toward the out-party - rather than in ideological extremity, and people often mislabel rising animosity as ideological polarization.

Conclusion: By modern polling and congressional voting metrics, the U.S. is more polarized than at any time since at least the 1970s-1990s, with affective dislike reaching historic highs. But by the standard of American history as a whole, the 1860s Civil War era - and to a lesser extent the 1790s and Gilded Age - were more deeply and violently divided.