5) The founders were deeply concerned about the development of political parties and factions in the United States. Why, then, did they develop and how do parties structure American politics

In the early days of America as a nation, the Founding Fathers considered that political parties were unnecessary elements for the normal development of political life in American society. They believed that these organizations were not positive, but instead aimed at generating internal divisions and creating unnecessary conflicts among citizens.

Therefore, the Founding Fathers were concerned to avoid the development of these political parties, but with the course of history the Founding Fathers themselves began to have ideological conflicts and political positioning differences among them, which motivated the development of support groups that would eventually end up becoming those political parties that the Founding Fathers themselves sought to avoid. Especially, the first political parties were the Federalist Party and the Democratic Republican Party: they developed towards the second term of President Washington, based on the differences between the different ideological groups regarding the role of the Federal Government and of each of the states.

Today, the predominant parties are the Democratic Party and the Republican Party, the former being the majority expression of the nation's liberals, while the Republicans are the conservative faction of the United States' society. Thus, the main role of political parties today is to channel opinions and ideologies, giving them an institutional framework that allows them to organize themselves politically to make joint decisions in favor of the nation.