Whigs and Democrats and deja vu

There comes a point during The Rise and Fall of the American Whig Party: Jacksonian Politics and the Onset of the Civil War - 1840, in fact - when author Michael Holt springs this on us:

Increasingly, Democrats portrayed Whigs as bigoted and self-righteous religious fanatics intent on imposing their ethical values on others. Whigs retorted that Democrats were immoral deadbeats or dangerous radicals bent on destroying the very fabric of society - property, morality, education, and the rule of law.

I wonder if he is projecting into the past.