<P> Experts have debated whether national politics in the United States of America is currently in the era of a Sixth Party System, or whether the Fifth Party System continues in some form to the present . Opinions also differ on when a Sixth Party System may have begun, with suggested dates ranging from the 1960s to the 1990s . Maisel and Brewer (2011) argue that the consensus among specialists is that the Sixth System is underway based on American electoral politics since the 1960s: </P> <P> Although most in the field now believe we are in a sixth party system, there is a fair amount of disagreement about how exactly we arrived at this new system and about its particular contours . Scholars do, however, agree that there has been significant change in American electoral politics since the 1960s . </P> <P> The perceived Sixth Party System is characterized by an electoral shift from the electoral coalitions of the Fifth Party System during the New Deal: the Republican Party became the dominant party in the South, rural areas, and suburbs; while the Democratic Party increasingly started to assemble a coalition of African - Americans, Latinos and white urban Progressives . A critical factor was the major transformation of the political system in the Reagan Era or "Age of Reagan" of the 1980s and beyond, led by Ronald Reagan . </P>

In the current sixth party system which of the following groups is most likely to vote democratic