Could it be that Donald Trump would react to his defeat, if he is defeated, in the 2016 election by forming a new political party? That’s the question we keep thinking about as the autophagy of the Republican Party consumes what so many pundits are insisting is his last chance of victory in November. For whatever Mr. Trump’s problems, it is clear that he has millions of loyal followers. Will they return to the Republican fold on the theory that the party establishment was right after all?

We don’t mean to rule out the possibility that Mr. Trump could yet win. We’re too close to the experience of Brexit, which elite opinion predicted for months would be defeated. Or the 2015 election at Israel, where polls predicted a razor thin result or a win by Labor only to be met with a runaway victory by Mr. Netanyahu. For that matter, there’s the 2004 American election, when the Swiftboat Veterans for Truth defeated an overconfident John Kerry.

Yet given the almost nihilistic way in which Mr. Trump has turned on the leaders of the party whose flag he’s flying, it’s hard not to wonder what will happen if he loses. He could, of course, wipe his hands of politics and return to business. Then again, too, he could try to seize control of the GOP, purge his adversaries within it, and remake it as the Trump Party. Or he could bolt the GOP, taking his millions of followers with him and launch a new party of his own.

If he does that — we’re not making a prediction here — it would be as American as apple pie. Our history is littered with parties created as vehicles to pursue all sorts of visions and represent all sorts of factions — the Prohibition Party, the Communist Party, the Black Panther Party, the Toleration Party, the Anti-Masonic Party, the Nullifier Party (which fought for the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions in which the two states vowed not to enforce the Alien and Sedition Acts).

We but touch the list. There was the Free Soil Party, the Greenback Party, the Silver Party, the Readjuster Party, the National Woman’s Party, the Vegetarian Party, the Boston Tea Party, Natural Law Party (which favored transcendental meditation), the Anti-Nebraska Party, and the National Democratic Party. The latter’s 15 minutes of fame was at 1896, when the regular Democrats nominated the populist William Jennings Bryan.

Bryan stood for an inflationary scheme of the free coinage of silver. It horrified even the New York Times, but it was loath to endorse the Republican, Wm. McKinley. So it endorsed the National Democratic Party’s nominee, an ex-general from Illinois named John M. Palmer, and his vice presidential nominee, Simon Bolivar Buckner, another ex-general (and newspaper editor). It was almost the last gasp of the so-called “Gold Democrats.” But we digress.

The point is that all sorts of political parties have come and gone in our glorious history, and it’s none too soon to start thinking of the possibilities in the years ahead. It’s not our purpose to suggest that the Republicans throw in the towel. But while people say the most lamentable things in the heat of battle, it’s not easy to recall a situation going to be as difficult to put together as the rift that Donald Trump’s campaign has opened within the Republican Party.

So if he loses it’s going to be something to watch. Not that the Republicans are the only ones with an issue. There are also Senator Sanders’ unhappy followers, stranded by the alliance of their leader with Secretary Clinton. Then again, too, Mr. Trump has been reaching out to them at every turn. If they both are cast off in the current contretemps, maybe they’ll leave the Republicans to their traditional leaders and — we’re not intending any kind of endorsement here — ally in time for the next election under the banner of the Trump Party.