Reddit mentions of Presidential Campaigns: From George Washington to George W. Bush

The last time a major political party died was the Whigs in the lead up to the Civil War. The Whig Party broke apart on the question of slavery. Northern factions became more anti-slavery, while Southern factions refused to abandon slavery. The Party could not contain these contradictory ideas, so it lost support and quickly found its members deserting the Whig Party for alternatives.

As the former Whigs began to abandon their party, new political parties appeared to take them in. Those parties included: the Free Soil Party, the American Party (sometimes known as the 'know-nothing' party) and the Republican Party. By the election of 1856, the Whigs were gone.

Interestingly enough, the Democratic Party also split on the issue of slavery in 1860, with Northern and Southern factions emerging to nominate their own candidates. However, the Democrats were able to recover after the Civil War and continue to be a major party to this day (of course).

The other major parties that died (The Federalists, Democratic-Republicans, National Republicans kinda) weren't really political parties in the sense that we understand them. They were more alliances of elites competing against each other, as opposed to mass mobilizing voters. The Federalists died largely as a result of the total victory of the Democratic-Republicans and the Democratic-Republicans also died largely as a result of their victory, leading to the somewhat party-less period known as the 'Era of Good Feelings.'

All the other parties you mention were minor parties that were either formed as result of a brief split from the major parties (Southern Democrats) or as a the result of a single influential man creating the party as a platform to run on (the Progressive Party).

In a sense the only true major political party that has died was the Whig Party.

So now comes the real question, why has there not been another party collapse in the 150 or so years after the Civil War? Why have we stuck to the Democrat/Republican divide, even as those parties have changed radically both in supporters and in issues?

The answer is that absent an issue so divisive as that it literally led to civil war, parties are pretty damn durable. Every time a major challenger to the two parties has emerged (such as the Progressive Party in 1912), one or both of the two parties have adjusted themselves and their issues to try to be welcoming to those voters and issues. Thus the Democratic Party moves from being a small government party in the 19th century, to being a progressive party in the early 20th to being the party of the New Deal in the mid-20th century.

In America's two party system, which is reinforced by our first-past-the-post system of elections, parties should be viewed less as solid ideological actors and more as alliances of disparate interests that come together in order to seek political advantage. Thus you have labor and environmentalists largely in the same party, not because those two views are immediately reconcilable, but because it is an advantageous political alliance. When those alliances break down, groups may switch from one party to another (something called 'realignment'). Thus the two parties survive, even as supporters and issues may change.

This is quickly veering into the realm of a political science discussion, so I'll just end here with a few quick answers to your questions.

1. The final years of the Whig Party were the chaotic years leading up to the Civil War.
   
2. The Whigs kept nominating war heroes in an attempt to find consensus
   
3. Lots of new minor parties and the Civil War
   
   Sources:
   https://www.amazon.com/Battle-Cry-Freedom-Civil-War/dp/019516895X
   https://www.amazon.com/John-Quincy-Adams-American-Visionary/dp/0061915416/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=
   https://www.amazon.com/Bully-Pulpit-Theodore-Roosevelt-Journalism-ebook/dp/B00BAWHPX2/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1468985270&sr=1-1&keywords=bully+pulpit+doris+kearns+goodwin#nav-subnav
   https://www.amazon.com/Presidential-Campaigns-George-Washington-Bush/dp/0195167163
   

Geez...I love all this high horse "both parties are the suck" talk. You know if the Greens didn't do something stupid like nominate crazy whack job Cynthia McKinney and the Libertarians weren't just basically a collection of pot smoking tax dodgers then maybe there'd be a "third choice".

Guess what the Dems/Repubs are all we've got for the foreseeable future.

And to anyone who thinks it's worse now than it was at anytime in the past is delusional. I can guarantee that day after G. Washington was sworn in that someone from the whale oil industry and the National Musket Association (NMA) were knocking on the door. Read Presidential Campaigns by Paul Boller to learn just how clean today's politics is compared to the good ol' days.

Anyone who looks at American politics and asks "Jesus Christ, when did it get so bad?" need to read this book to understand that nothing has changed in almost 250 years.

I think what happens is that when we're younger and stupid, we watch political talking heads toss around concepts we don't get. We adopt the beliefs of our authority figures, and repeat epithets or insults that we kinda don't really understand. As we mature and learn more about the world around us, the partisan political debate starts to come into focus and we're shocked at how childish it's become.