Moderates

The term moderate is used to describe a political view that is neither consistently conservative nor liberal. Often a politician who is an anti-conservative will describe himself as a "moderate" as a way of appearing more reasonable to the public. The liberal media will also use the term "moderate" as a more popular label for themselves and their friends than the label liberal is, in an attempt to deceive viewers into believing that their beliefs are in line with what "average" Americans believe.

Historically in France, moderates were a middle-of-the-road political faction or group during the French Revolution. The French National Assembly established a constitutional monarchy and, in 1791, adopted a new constitution that created a Legislative Assembly. Three factions quickly formed in the new Legislative Assembly, known as the radicals (liberals), moderates (centrists) and Conservatives, similar to those political movements today in the United States.

The three factions sat in different sections of the large assembly hall, with the radicals (liberals) sitting on the left, the moderates sitting in the center, and the Conservatives sitting on the right. That gave rise to the left-center-right terminology that we still use today in the United States to describe these three political groups.

The number of people who consider themselves moderates in the United States today outweighs those who consider themselves liberal or conservative, and that number has remained constant since the middle 1970s.