Answer:
Acute domestic policy issues, society' demand for strong third party. Third parties suggested strong election platform, and offered solution of these acute issues. The Populist Party offered ideas that affected some economic policies of the New Deal while platforms of two major candidated were rather weak. In 1992, independent candidate Ross Perot emphasized the budget deficit in his campaign while neither Bill Clinton nor George H. W. Bush talked much about it.
Explanation:
The campaign of 1912 was extremely sharp. Former President Theodore Roosevelt, who did not receive Republican support, convoked his own convention and created a new Progressive Party.
Another case when the “third” candidate achieved relatively significant percentage results (although he remained in third place) was the 1992 election, when Ross Perot won 18.9% of the vote. Since the 90s of the 20th century, opinion polls have constantly shown a high level of support from the population for the concept of a third party.
The nomination of Theodore Roosevelt as a candidate from the third party in 1912 during the split in the Republican Party took away the votes of the Republicans and thereby allowed the Democrat Woodrow Wilson to be elected, although he did not get the majority of the vote. In the 1992 elections, Democrat Bill Clinton, who also did not get the majority of votes, was ahead of the republican rival, including due to the presence of a strong third independent candidate, Ross Perot.
American politicians at the beginning of the 20th century formulated the main dilemma of the current moment: the well-being of an individual or the development of big business. The derivatives of this dilemma were different: support for small or large enterprises, high or low taxes, free trade or protectionism, cooperation with trade unions or with trusts.
Theodore Roosevelt was a leftist politician. Putting human well-being in the first place, declaring social justice the highest value and striving to protect, strengthen, and rely on the middle class, Roosevelt proclaimed the doctrine of "new nationalism." This doctrine was essentially social democratic. The party stood for "pure democracy," that is, democracy without influence of the special interests.
During the 1992 elections, the political situation was also quite acute. The victory in the Cold War, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the USSR, the demonstrative punishment of Saddam Hussein during Operation Desert Storm, the democratization of states, the fall of the apartheid regime in South Africa - all this happened under US President George W. Bush. It seemed that with such achievements nothing should have shaken his position and prevented his re-election for a second term. However, the disappearance of the main enemy has directed the attention of Americans to internal problems - a recession in the economy, growth in public debt, taxes, and interracial relations. Texas businessman Ross Perot, a “populist from East Texas,” built his campaign on opposition from the Washington establishment and gradually won voters from both Republicans and Democrats. He promised the Americans a balanced budget, protection of the national producer, the creation of electronic city administrations and even stop the presidential motorcade to the red light.
