The
United
States Republican Party is the second oldest currently
existing
political party in the
United States.
Creation
The Republican Party was first organized in 1854, growing out of
the "anti-Nebraska" coalition of old Whigs, freesoil Democrats etc.
who mobilized in opposition to
Stephen
Douglas's January 1854 introduction of the
Kansas-Nebraska Act into Congress, a
bill which repealed the 1820
Missouri compromise prohibition on
slavery north of
latitude 36°
30' in the old Louisiana purchase territories, and so was
viewed as an aggressive expansionist pro-slavery maneuver by many.
Besides opposition to slavery, the new party put forward a
progressive vision of modernizing the United States—emphasizing
higher education, banking, railroads, industry and cities, while
promising free homesteads to farmers. They vigorously argued that
free-market labor was superior to slavery and the very foundation
of civic virtue and true American values—this is the "Free Soil,
Free Labor, Free Men" ideology explored by historian
Eric Foner. The Republicans absorbed the previous
traditions of its members, most of whom had been
Whigs, such as
Alvan E. Bovay
and
Horace Greeley; others had been
Democrats or members of third parties (especially the
Free Soil Party and the
American Party or
Know Nothings). Many
Democrats who
joined up were rewarded with governorships: (
Nathaniel P. Banks of Massachusetts,
Kinsley Bingham of Michigan,
William H. Bissell of Illinois,
Salmon P. Chase of Ohio,
Hannibal Hamlin of Maine,
Samuel J. Kirkwood of Iowa,
Ralph Metcalf of New Hampshire,
Lot Morrill of Maine, and
Alexander Randall of Wisconsin) or seats
in the U.S. Senate (Bingham and Hamlin, as well as
James R. Doolittle of Wisconsin,
John P. Hale of New
Hampshire,
Preston King of New York,
Lyman Trumbull of Illinois, and
David Wilmot of Pennsylvania.) Since
its inception, its chief opposition has been the
Democratic
Party, but the amount of flow back and forth of prominent
politicians between the two parties was quite high from 1854 to
1896.
Two small
cities of the Yankee diaspora, Ripon,
Wisconsin
and Jackson,
Michigan
, claim to be
the birthplace of the Republican Party (in other words, meetings
held there were some of the first 1854 anti-Nebraska assemblies to
call themselves by the name "Republican"). Ripon held the
first county convention on
March 20,
1854. Jackson held the first statewide
convention where delegates including
Abraham Lincoln from Illinois
July 6,
1854 declared their new
party opposed to the expansion of slavery into new territories and
selected a state-wide slate of candidates. The Midwest took the
lead in forming state party tickets, while the eastern states
lagged a year or so. There were no efforts to organize the party in
the South, apart from a few areas adjacent to free states. The
party initially had its base in the
Northeast and
Midwest.
The party launched its
first national convention in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
, in February 1856, with its first national nominating
convention held in the summer in Philadelphia
, Pennsylvania.
John C. Frémont ran as the first Republican
nominee for
President
in 1856, using the
political
slogan: "
Free soil, free labor,
free speech, free men, Frémont." Although Frémont's bid was
unsuccessful, the party showed a strong base. It dominated in New
England, New York and the northern Midwest, and had a strong
presence in the rest of the North. It had almost no support in the
South, where it was roundly denounced in 1856-60 as a divisive
force that threatened civil war.
Historians have explored the ethnocultural foundations of the
party, along the line that ethnic and religious groups set the
moral standards for their members, who then carried those standards
into politics. The churches also provided social networks that
politicians used to sign up voters. The pietistic churches
emphasized the duty of the Christian to purge sin from society. Sin
took many forms—alcoholism, polygamy and slavery became special
targets for the Republicans. The Yankees, who dominated New
England, much of upstate New York, and much of the upper Midwest
were the strongest supporters of the new party. This was especially
true for the pietistic Congregationalists and Presbyterians among
them and (during the war), the Methodists, along with Scandinavian
Lutherans. The Quakers were a small tight-knit group that was
heavily Republican. The liturgical churches (Roman Catholic,
Episcopal, German Lutheran), by contrast, largely rejected the
moralism of the Republican Party; most of their adherents voted
Democratic.
The Civil War and an era of Republican dominance:
1860–1896
The election of
Abraham Lincoln in
1860 ended the domination of the fragile coalition of pro-slavery
southern Democrats and conciliatory northern Democrats which had
existed since the days of
Andrew
Jackson. Instead, a new era of Republican dominance based in
the industrial and agricultural north ensued. Republicans still
often refer to their party as the "party of Lincoln" in honor of
the first Republican President.
The
Third Party System was
dominated by the Republican Party (it lost in 1884 and 1892.)
Lincoln proved brilliantly successful in uniting the factions of
his party to fight for the Union. However he usually fought the
Radical Republicans who demanded
harsher measures. Most Democrats at first were
War Democrats, and supportive until the fall
of 1862. When Lincoln added the abolition of slavery as a war goal,
many war Democrats became "peace Democrats." Most of the state
Republican parties accepted the antislavery goal except Kentucky.
In Congress, the party passed major legislation to promote rapid
modernization, including a national banking system, high
tariffs, the first temporary income tax, many
excise taxes, paper money issued without backing ("greenbacks"), a
huge national debt, homestead laws, railroads, and aid to education
and agriculture. The Republicans denounced the peace-oriented
Democrats as disloyal
Copperheads and
won enough War Democrats to maintain their majority in 1862; in
1864, they formed a coalition with many War Democrats as the
National Union
Party which reelected Lincoln easily.
During the war, upper
middle-class men in major cities formed Union Leagues
, to promote and help finance the war effort.

"Union" ticket in 1864; party men gave
these to voters to deposit in the ballot box
Reconstruction: Blacks, Carpetbaggers and Scalawags
In
Reconstruction, how
to deal with the ex-Confederates and the freed slaves, or
freedmen, were the major issues. By 1864,
Radical Republicans controlled Congress
and demanded more aggressive action against slavery, and more
vengeance toward the Confederates. Lincoln held them off, but just
barely. Republicans at first welcomed President
Andrew Johnson; the Radicals thought he was
one of them and would take a hard line in punishing the South.
Johnson however broke with them and formed a loose alliance with
moderate Republicans and Democrats. The showdown came in the
Congressional elections of 1866, in which the Radicals won a
sweeping victory and took full control of Reconstruction, passing
key laws over the veto. Johnson was impeached by the House, but
acquitted by the Senate.
With the election of
Ulysses S.
Grant in 1868, the Radicals had
control of Congress, the party and the Army, and attempted to build
a solid Republican base in the South using the votes of Freedmen,
Scalawags and
Carpetbaggers, supported directly by U.S. Army
detachments.
Republicans all across the South formed local
clubs called Union
Leagues
that effectively mobilized the voters, discussed
issues, and when necessary fought off Ku
Klux Klan (KKK) attacks. Thousands died on both
sides.
Grant supported radical reconstruction programs in the South, the
Fourteenth
Amendment, and equal civil and voting rights for the freedmen.
Most of all he was the hero of the war veterans, who marched to his
tune. The party had become so large that factionalism was
inevitable; it was hastened by Grant's tolerance of high levels of
corruption typified by the
Whiskey
Ring. Many of the founders of the GOP joined the movement, as
did many powerful newspaper editors. They nominated
Horace Greeley for president, who also gained
the Democratic nomination, but the ticket was defeated in a
landslide. The depression of 1873 energized the Democrats. They won
control of the House and formed "
Redeemer"
coalitions which recaptured control of each southern state, in some
cases using threats and violence.
Reconstruction came to an end when the contested election of 1876
was awarded by a special
electoral commission to
Republican
Rutherford B.
Hayes who promised, through the
unofficial
Compromise of 1877, to
withdraw federal troops from control of the last three southern
states. The region then became the
Solid
South, giving overwhelming majorities of its electoral votes
and Congressional seats to the Democrats until 1964.
In terms of racial issues, "White Republicans as well as Democrats
solicited black votes but reluctantly rewarded blacks with
nominations for office only when necessary, even then reserving the
more choice positions for whites. The results were predictable:
these half-a-loaf gestures satisfied neither black nor white
Republicans. The fatal weakness of the Republican Party in Alabama,
as elsewhere in the South, was its inability to create a biracial
political party. And while in power even briefly, they failed to
protect their members from Democratic terror. Alabama Republicans
were forever on the defensive, verbally and physically."
Social pressure eventually forced most Scalawags to join the
conservative/Democratic Redeemer coalition. A minority persisted
and formed the "tan" half of the "Black and Tan" Republican Party,
a minority in every southern state after 1877.
The Gilded Age: 1877–1890
The "GOP" (short for Grand Old Party, as it was now nicknamed)
split into factions in the late 1870s. The Stalwarts, followers of
Senator
Roscoe Conkling, defended
the
spoils system. The Half-Breeds,
who followed Senator
James G.
Blaine of Maine, pushed for reform
of the
Civil service. Independents who
opposed the spoils system altogether were called "
Mugwumps." In 1884 Mugwumps rejected
James G. Blaine as corrupt and helped elect Democrat
Grover Cleveland; most returned to
the party by 1888.
As the Northern post-war economy boomed with industry, railroads,
mines, and fast-growing cities, as well as prosperous agriculture,
the Republicans took credit and promoted policies to keep the fast
growth going. The Democratic Party was largely controlled by
pro-business
Bourbon Democrats
until 1896. The GOP supported big business generally, the
gold standard, high
tariff, and generous pensions for
Union veterans. By 1890, however, the Republicans had agreed to the
Sherman Anti-Trust Act and
the
Interstate Commerce
Commission in response to complaints from owners of small
businesses and farmers. The high
McKinley Tariff of 1890 hurt the party and
the Democrats swept to a landslide in the off-year elections, even
defeating McKinley himself.
Foreign affairs seldom became partisan issues (except for the
annexation of Hawaii, which Republicans favored and Democrats
opposed). Much more salient were cultural issues. The GOP supported
the pietistic Protestants (especially the Methodists,
Congregationalists, Presbyterians, and Scandinavian Lutherans) who
demanded
Prohibition. That angered wet
Republicans, especially
German
Americans, who broke ranks in 1890-1892, handing power to the
Democrats.
Demographic trends aided the Democrats, as the German and Irish
Catholic immigrants were mostly Democrats, and outnumbered the
British and Scandinavian Republicans. During the 1880s, elections
were remarkably close. The Democrats usually lost, but won in
1884 and
1892. In
the 1894 Congressional
elections, the GOP scored the biggest landslide in its history,
as Democrats were blamed for the
severe
economic depression 1893-1897 and the violent coal and railroad
strikes of 1894.
Ethnocultural politics: pietistic Republicans versus liturgical
Democrats
|
Voting Behavior by Religion, Northern USA
Late 19th century |
|
|
% Dem |
% GOP |
|
Immigrant Groups |
|
|
|
Irish Catholics |
80 |
20 |
|
All Catholics |
70 |
30 |
|
Confessional German Lutherans |
65 |
35 |
|
German Reformed |
60 |
40 |
|
French Canadian Catholics |
50 |
50 |
|
Less Confessional German Lutherans |
45 |
55 |
|
English Canadians |
40 |
60 |
|
British Stock |
35 |
65 |
|
German Sectarians |
30 |
70 |
|
Norwegian Lutherans |
20 |
80 |
|
Swedish Lutherans |
15 |
85 |
|
Haugean Norwegians |
5 |
95 |
|
Natives: Northern Stock |
|
|
|
Quakers |
5 |
95 |
|
Free Will Baptists |
20 |
80 |
|
Congregational |
25 |
75 |
|
Methodists |
25 |
75 |
|
Regular Baptists |
35 |
65 |
|
Blacks |
40 |
60 |
|
Presbyterians |
40 |
60 |
|
Episcopalians |
45 |
55 |
|
Natives: Southern Stock (living in North) |
|
|
|
Disciples |
50 |
50 |
|
Presbyterians |
70 |
30 |
|
Baptists |
75 |
25 |
|
Methodists |
90 |
10 |
From 1860 to 1912, the Republicans took advantage of the
association of the Democrats with "Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion".
Rum stood for the liquor interests and the tavernkeepers, in
contrast to the GOP, which had a strong dry element. "Romanism"
meant Catholics, especially Irish Americans, who ran the Democratic
Party in every big city, and whom the Republicans denounced for
political corruption. "Rebellion" stood for the Confederates who
tried to break the Union in 1861, and the
Copperheads in the North who sympathized with
them.
Demographic trends aided the Democrats, as the German and Irish
Catholic immigrants were Democrats, and outnumbered the English and
Scandinavian Republicans. During the 1880s and 1890s, the
Republicans struggled against the Democrats' efforts, winning
several close elections and losing two to Grover Cleveland (in
1884 and
1892).
Religious lines were sharply drawn. Methodists, Congregationalists,
Presbyterians, Scandinavian Lutherans and other pietists in the
North were tightly linked to the GOP. In sharp contrast, liturgical
groups, especially the Catholics, Episcopalians, and German
Lutherans, looked to the Democratic Party for protection from
pietistic moralism, especially prohibition. Both parties cut across
the class structure, with the Democrats more bottom-heavy.
Cultural issues, especially prohibition and foreign language
schools became important because of the sharp religious divisions
in the electorate. In the North, about 50% of the voters were
pietistic Protestants (Methodists, Scandinavian Lutherans,
Presbyterians, Congregationalists, Disciples of Christ) who
believed the government should be used to reduce social sins, such
as drinking. Liturgical churches (Roman Catholics, German
Lutherans, Episcopalians) comprised over a quarter of the vote and
wanted the government to stay out of the morality business.
Prohibition debates and referendums heated up politics in most
states over a period of decade, as national prohibition was finally
passed in 1918 (and repealed in 1932), serving as a major issue
between the wet Democrats and the dry GOP.
The Progressive Era: 1896–1932
The election of
William McKinley in
1896 is widely seen
as a resurgence of Republican dominance and is sometimes cited as a
realigning election.

1896 GOP poster warns against free
silver.
The
Fourth Party System was
dominated by Republican presidents, with the exception of the two
terms of Democrat
Woodrow Wilson,
1913-1921. McKinley promised that high tariffs would end the severe
hardship caused by the
Panic of 1893,
and that the GOP would guarantee a sort of pluralism in which all
groups would benefit. He denounced
William Jennings Bryan, the
Democratic nominee, as a dangerous radical whose plans for "Free
Silver" at 16-1 (or
Bimetallism) would
bankrupt the economy.
McKinley relied heavily on finance, railroads, industry and the
middle classes for his support and cemented the Republicans as the
party of business; his
campaign
manager, Ohio's
Mark Hanna, developed
a detailed plan for getting contributions from the business world,
and McKinley outspent his rival
William Jennings Bryan by a large
margin. This emphasis on business was in part mitigated by
Theodore Roosevelt, McKinley's successor
after assassination, who engaged in
trust-busting. McKinley was the first
president to promote
pluralism, arguing that
prosperity would be shared by all ethnic and religious
groups.
Theodore Roosevelt, who became
president in 1901, had the most dynamic personality of the era in
the nation. Roosevelt had to contend with men like Senator
Mark Hanna, whom he outmaneuvered to gain control
of the convention in 1904 that renominated him and he won after
promising to continue McKinley's policies. More difficult to handle
was conservative House Speaker
Joseph Gurney Cannon.
Roosevelt achieved modest legislative gains in terms of railroad
legislation and pure food laws. He was more successful in Court,
bringing antitrust suits that broke up the
Northern Securities Company
trust and
Standard Oil. Roosevelt moved
left in his last two years in office but was unable to pass major
Square Deal proposals. He did succeed in
naming his successor Secretary of War
William Howard Taft who easily defeated
Bryan again in the
1908.

President Teddy Roosevelt watches GOP
team pull apart on tariff issue
The tariff issue was pulling the GOP apart. Roosevelt tried to
postpone the issue but Taft had to meet it head on in 1909 with the
Payne-Aldrich Tariff Act.
Eastern conservatives led by
Nelson
W. Aldrich wanted high tariffs
on manufactured goods (especially woolens), while Midwesterners
called for low tariffs. Aldrich tricked them by lowering the tariff
on farm products, which outraged the farmers. Insurgent
Midwesterners led by
George Norris
revolted against the conservatives led by Speaker Cannon. The
Democrats won control of the House in 1910, as the rift between
insurgents and conservatives widened. In 1912 Roosevelt broke with
Taft and tried for a third term. He was outmaneuvered by Taft and
lost the nomination. Roosevelt led his delegates out of the
convention and created a new party, the
Progressive, or
"Bull Moose" ticket in
the election of 1912. Few
party leaders followed him except
Hiram
Johnson of California. The Roosevelt-caused split in the
Republican vote resulted in a decisive victory for Democrat
Woodrow Wilson, temporarily
interrupting the Republican era.
The Republicans welcomed the
Progressive
Era at the state and local level. The first important reform
mayor was
Hazen S. Pingree of Detroit (1890-97) who was
elected governor of Michigan in 1896. In New York City the
Republicans joined nonpartisan reformers to battle
Tammany Hall, and elected Seth Low (1902-03).
Golden Rule Jones was first
elected mayor of Toledo as a Republican in 1897, but was reelected
as an independent when his party refused to renominate him. Many
Republican civic leaders, following the example of
Mark Hanna, were active in the
National Civic Federation, which
promoted urban reforms and sought to avoid wasteful strikes.

TR's 1908 Farewell speeches sought
Progressive goals but did not pass Congress
The party controlled the presidency throughout the 1920s, running
on a platform of opposition to the
League of Nations, high tariffs, and
promotion of business interests.
Warren G. Harding,
Calvin
Coolidge and
Herbert Hoover were
resoundingly elected in
1920,
1924, and
1928 respectively. The
breakaway efforts of Senator
Robert
LaFollette in 1924 failed to stop a landslide for Coolidge, and
his movement fell apart.
The Teapot Dome Scandal
threatened to hurt the party but Harding died and
Coolidge blamed everything on him, as the opposition splintered in
1924. The pro-business policies of the decade seemed to
produce an unprecedented prosperity—until the
Wall Street Crash of 1929 heralded
the
Great Depression. Although the
party did very well in large cities and among ethnic Catholics in
presidential elections of 1920-24, it was unable to hold those
gains in 1928. By 1932 the cities—for the first time ever—had
become Democratic strongholds.
Hoover, by nature an activist, attempted to do what he could to
alleviate the widespread suffering caused by the Depression, but
his strict adherence to what he believed were Republican principles
precluded him from establishing relief directly from the federal
government. The Depression cost Hoover the presidency with the
1932 landslide
election of
Franklin D.
Roosevelt. Roosevelt's
New Deal coalition controlled
American politics for most of the next three decades, excepting the
two-term presidency of Republican
Dwight Eisenhower. The Democrats made
major gains in the 1930 midterm elections, giving them
congressional parity (though not control) for the first time since
Woodrow Wilson's presidency.
The African American vote held for Hoover in 1932, but started
moving toward Roosevelt. By 1940 the majority of northern blacks
were voting Democratic.
Opposing the New Deal Coalition: 1932-1980
After Roosevelt took office in 1933, New Deal legislation sailed
through Congress at lightning speed. In the 1934 midterm elections,
ten Republican senators went down to defeat, leaving them with only
25 against 71 Democrats. The House of Representatives was also
split in a similar ratio. The "Second New Deal" was heavily
criticized by the Republicans in Congress, who likened it to
class warfare and
socialism. The volume of legislation, as well as
the inability of the Republicans to block it, soon made the
opposition to Roosevelt develop into bitterness and sometimes
hatred for "that man in the White House."
Minority parties tend to factionalize and after 1936 the GOP split
into a conservative faction (dominant in the West and Midwest) and
a liberal faction (dominant in the Northeast) – combined with a
residual base of inherited progressive Republicanism active
throughout the century.
In 1936 Kansas governor
Alf Landon and his young followers
defeated the
Herbert Hoover faction.
Landon generally supported most New Deal programs, but carried only
two states in the Roosevelt landslide with his moderate campaign.
The GOP was left with only 16 senators and 88 representatives to
oppose the New Deal, with Massachusetts Senator
Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. as the sole
victor over a Democratic incumbent.
Roosevelt alienated many conservative Democrats, in 1937, by his
unexpected plan to “pack” the Supreme Court via the
Judiciary Reorganization
Bill of 1937. Following a sharp recession that hit early in
1938, major strikes all over the country, and Roosevelt's failed
efforts to radically reorganize the Supreme Court and federal
courts, the GOP gained 75 House seats in 1938. Conservative
Democrats, mostly from the South, joined with Republicans led by
Senator
Robert A. Taft to create the
conservative coalition, which
dominated domestic issues in Congress until 1964.
From 1939 through 1941, there was a sharp debate within the GOP
about support for Britain in
World War
II.
Internationalists, such as
Henry Stimson and
Frank
Knox, wanted to support Britain and
isolationists,
such as
Robert Taft and
Arthur Vandenberg, strongly opposed these
moves as unwise, if not unconstitutional. The
America First movement was a bipartisan
coalition of isolationists. In
1940, a total
unknown,
Wendell Willkie, at the
last minute, won over the party, the delegates and was nominated.
He crusaded against the inefficiencies of the New Deal and
Roosevelt's break with the strong tradition against a third term.
Pearl Harbor ended the isolationist-internationalist debate. The
Republicans further cut the Democratic majority in the 1942 midterm
elections. With wartime production creating prosperity, the
Conservative coalition
terminated most New Deal relief programs.
Senator
Robert Taft of Ohio represented
the wing of the party that continued to oppose
New Deal reforms and continued to champion
isolationism.
Thomas
Dewey, governor of New York, represented the Northeastern wing
of the party. Dewey did not reject the New Deal programs, but
demanded more efficiency, more support for economic growth, and
less corruption. He was more willing than Taft to support Britain
in 1939-40. After the war the isolationists wing strenuously
opposed the
United Nations, and was
half-hearted in opposition to world Communism.
As a minority party, the GOP had two wings: The "left wing"
supported most of the New Deal while promising to run it more
efficiently. The "right wing" opposed the New Deal from the
beginning and managed to repeal large parts during the 1940s in
cooperation with conservative southern Democrats in the
conservative coalition. Liberals, led by Dewey, dominated the
Northeast. Conservatives, led by Taft, dominated the Midwest. The
West was split, and the South was still solidly Democratic. Dewey
did not reject the New Deal programs, but demanded more efficiency,
more support for economic growth, and less corruption. He was more
willing than Taft to support Britain in the early years of the war.
In
1944, a
clearly frail Roosevelt defeated Dewey, who was now governor of New
York, for his fourth term, but Dewey made a good showing that would
lead to his selection as the candidate in 1948.
Roosevelt died in office in 1945, and
Harry S. Truman became president. With the end of the
war, unrest among organized labor led to many strikes in 1946, and
the resulting disruptions helped the GOP. With the blunders of the
Truman administration in 1945 and 1946, the slogans "Had Enough?"
and "To Err is Truman" became Republican rallying cries, and the
GOP won control of Congress for the first time since 1928, with
Joseph William Martin,
Jr. as
Speaker of the
House. The
Taft-Hartley Act of
1947 was designed to balance the rights of management and labor. It
was the central issue of many elections in industrial states in the
1940s and 1950s, but the unions were never able to repeal it.
In 1948, with Republicans split left and right, Truman boldly
called Congress into a special session, and sent it a load of
liberal legislation consistent with the Dewey platform, and dared
them to act on it, knowing that the conservative Republicans would
block action. Truman then attacked the Republican "Do-Nothing
Congress" as a whipping boy for all of the nation's problems.
Truman stunned Dewey and the Republicans with a plurality of just
over two million popular votes (out of nearly 49 million cast), but
a decisive 303-189 victory in the Electoral College.
Eisenhower and Nixon: 1953–1974
Eisenhower and Nixon, 1953: the first Republican presidential
inauguration in 24 years.
In 1952,
Dwight Eisenhower, an
internationalist allied with the Dewey wing, was drafted as a GOP
candidate by a small group of Republicans led by
Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. in order that
he challenge Taft on foreign policy issues. The two men were not
far apart on domestic issues. Eisenhower's victory broke a 20 year
Democratic lock on the White House. Eisenhower did not try to roll
back the New Deal, but he did expand the Social Security system and
built the Interstate Highway system.
After the war the isolationists in the conservative wing opposed
the
United Nations, and were
half-hearted in exercising opposition to the expansion of Communism
around the world.
Dwight
Eisenhower, a NATO commander, defeated Taft in 1952 on foreign
policy issues. Eisenhower was an exception to most presidents in
that he usually let Nixon handle party affairs (controlling the
national committee and taking the roles of chief spokesman and
chief fundraiser).
Richard Nixon was
defeated in 1960 in a close election, dooming his moderate wing of
the party.
The conservatives in 1964 made a comeback under the leadership of
Barry Goldwater who defeated
moderates and liberals such as (most prominently)
Nelson Rockefeller and
Margaret Chase Smith as the Republican
candidate for the 1964 election. Goldwater was strongly opposed to
the New Deal and the United Nations, but he rejected isolationism
and containment, calling for an aggressive anti-Communist foreign
policy. In the
presidential election
of 1964, he was defeated by
Lyndon
Johnson in a landslide that brought down many senior Republican
Congressmen across the country. Goldwater won five states in the
deep South, the strongest showing by a Republican presidential
candidate in the South since 1872. Goldwater blamed the magnitude
of his defeat on the assassination of
John F. Kennedy a year before the election,
and on Johnson running a campaign of smears.
The
New Deal Coalition collapsed
in the mid 1960s in the face of urban riots, the
Vietnam War, the opposition of many Southern
Democrats to
desegregation and the
Civil
Rights movement and disillusionment that the New Deal could be
revived by Lyndon Johnson's Great Society. Nixon defeated both
Hubert Humphrey and
George C. Wallace in 1968. When the Democratic left
took over their party in 1972, Nixon won reelection by carrying 49
states. His involvement in
Watergate brought disgrace and a forced
resignation in 1974 and any long-term movement toward the GOP was
interrupted by the scandal.
Gerald Ford
succeeded Nixon and gave him a full pardon—thereby giving the
Democrats a powerful issue they used to sweep the 1974 off-year
elections. Ford never fully recovered, and in 1976 he barely
defeated
Ronald Reagan for the
nomination. The Democrats made major gains in Congress, and the
taint of Watergate and the nation's economic difficulties
contributed to the election of Democrat
Jimmy Carter in
1976, running as a
Washington outsider.
Ronald Reagan was elected President in the 1980 election by a
landslide vote, not predicted by most voter polling. Running on a
"Peace Through Strength" platform to combat the Communist threat
and massive tax cuts to revitalize the economy, Reagan's strong
persona proved too much for Carter. Reagan's election also gave
Republicans control of the Senate for the first time in decades.
Dubbed the "Reagan Revolution" he fundamentally altered several
long standing debates in Washington, namely dealing with the Soviet
threat and reviving the economy. His election saw the conservative
wing of the party gain control. While reviled by liberal opponents
in his day, his proponents contend his programs provided
unprecedented economic growth, and spurred the collapse of the
former Soviet Union. Currently regarded as one of the most popular
and successful presidents in the modern era (1960-present.) He
inspired conservatives to greater electoral victories by being
re-elected in a landslide against Walter Mondale in 1984 but
oversaw the loss of the Senate in 1986.
Strength of parties in 1977 |
Party |
Republican |
Democratic |
Independent |
Party ID (Gallup) |
22% |
47% |
31% |
Congressmen |
181 |
354 |
|
House |
143 |
292 |
|
Senate |
38 |
62 |
|
% House popular vote nationally |
42% |
56% |
2% |
in the East |
41% |
57% |
2% |
in the South |
37% |
62% |
2% |
in the Midwest |
47% |
52% |
1% |
in the West |
43% |
55% |
2% |
Governors |
12 |
37 |
1 |
State Legislators |
2,370 |
5,128 |
55 |
31% |
68% |
1% |
State legislature control |
18 |
80 |
1 |
in the East |
5 |
13 |
0 |
in the South |
0 |
32 |
0 |
in the Midwest |
5 |
17 |
1 |
in the West |
8 |
18 |
0 |
States' one party control
of legislature and governorship
|
1 |
29 |
0 |
|
Moderate Republicans of 1960-80
The term
Rockefeller Republican was used 1960-80 to
designate a faction of the party holding "moderate" views similar
to those of the late
Nelson
Rockefeller,
governor of New
York from 1959 to 1974 and vice president under President
Gerald Ford in 1974-77. Before
Rockefeller,
Tom Dewey, governor of New
York 1942-54 and GOP presidential nominee in 1944 and 1948 was the
leader.
Dwight Eisenhower and his
aide
Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr.
reflected many of their views. An important leader in the 1950s was
Connecticut Republican Senator
Prescott
Bush, father and grandfather of presidents
George H. W. Bush
and
George W. Bush. After Rockefeller left the national
stage in 1976, this faction of the party was more often called
"moderate Republicans," in contrast to the conservatives who
rallied to
Ronald Reagan.Historically,
Rockefeller Republicans were moderate or liberal on domestic and
social policies. They favored New Deal programs, including
regulation and welfare. They were very strong supporters of civil
rights. They were strongly supported by big business on Wall Street
(New York City). In fiscal policy they favored balanced budgets and
relatively high tax levels to keep the budget balanced. They sought
long-term economic growth through entrepreneurships, not tax cuts.
In state politics, they were strong supporters of state colleges
and universities, low tuition, and large research budgets. They
favored infrastructure improvements, such as highway projects. In
foreign policy they were internationalists, and anti-Communists.
They felt
the best way to counter Communism was sponsoring economic growth
(through foreign aid), maintaining a strong military, and keeping
close ties to NATO
.
Geographically their base was the Northeast, from Pennsylvania to
Maine.
Barry Goldwater crusaded
against the Rockefeller Republicans, beating Rockefeller narrowly
in the California primary of 1964. That set the stage for a
conservative resurgence, based in the South and West, in opposition
to the Northeast.
Ronald Reagan
continued in the same theme, but
George H. W. Bush
was more closely associated with the moderates.
Realignment: The South becomes Republican
In the century after
Reconstruction, the
white South identified with the
Democratic Party. The
Democrats' lock on power was so strong, the region was called the
Solid South. The Republicans controlled
certain parts of the Appalachian mountains, and they sometimes did
compete for statewide office in the border states. Before 1948, the
southern Democrats saw their party as the defender of the southern
way of life, which included a respect for states' rights and an
appreciation for traditional southern values. They repeatedly
warned against the aggressive designs of Northern liberals and
Republicans, as well as the civil rights activists they denounced
as "outside agitators." Thus there was a serious barrier to
becoming a Republican.
In 1948 Democrats alienated white Southerners in two ways. The
Democratic National Convention adopted a strong civil rights plank,
leading to a walkout by Southerners. Two weeks later President
Harry Truman signed Executive Order 9981 integrating the armed
forces. From 1948 onward, southern whites looked for political
accommodation for their views.
By 1964, the Democratic lock on the South was decisively broken.
The long-term cause was that the region was becoming more like the
rest of the nation and could not long stand apart in terms of
racial segregation. Modernization that brought factories,
businesses, and cities, and millions of migrants from the North;
far more people graduated from high school and college. Meanwhile
the cotton and tobacco basis of the traditional South faded away,
as former farmers moved to town or commuted to factory jobs.The
immediate cause of the political transition involved civil rights.
The
civil
rights movement caused enormous controversy in the white South
with many attacking it as a violation of states' rights. When
segregation was outlawed by court order and by the Civil Rights
acts of 1964 and 1965, a die-hard element resisted integration, led
by Democratic governors
Orval Faubus of
Arkansas,
Lester Maddox of Georgia,
and, especially
George Wallace of
Alabama. These populist governors appealed to a less-educated,
blue-collar electorate that on economic grounds favored the
Democratic Party, but supported segregation. After passage of the
Civil Rights Act most Southerners accepted the integration of most
institutions (except public schools). With the old barrier to
becoming a Republican removed, traditional Southerners joined the
new middle class and the Northern transplants in moving toward the
Republican Party. Integration thus liberated Southern politics,
just as
Martin Luther King had
promised. Meanwhile the newly enfranchised black voters supported
Democratic candidates at the 85-90% level.
The South's transition to a Republican stronghold took decades.
First the states started voting Republican in presidential
elections—the Democrats countered that by nominating Southerners
who could carry some states in the region, such as
Jimmy Carter in 1976, and
Bill Clinton in 1992 and 1996; however, the
strategy did not work with
Al Gore in 2000.
Then the states began electing Republican senators to fill open
seats caused by retirements, and finally governors and state
legislatures changed sides. Georgia was the last state to fall,
with
Sonny Perdue taking the
governorship in 2002. Republicans aided the process with
redistricting that protected the African American and Hispanic vote
(as required by the Civil Rights laws), but split up the remaining
white Democrats so that Republicans mostly would win. In 2006 the
Supreme Court endorsed nearly all of the gerrymandering engineered
by
Tom DeLay that swung the Texas
Congressional delegation to the GOP in 2004.
In addition to its white middle class base, Republicans attracted
strong majorities from the
Evangelical Christian vote, which had
been nonpolitical before 1980. The national Democratic Party's
support for liberal social stances such as
abortion drove many former Democrats into a
Republican Party that was embracing the conservative views on these
issues. Conversely, liberal Republicans in the northeast began to
join the Democratic Party.
In 1969 in The Emerging Republican
Majority, Kevin Phillips, argued
that support from Southern whites and growth in the Sun Belt
, among other
factors, was driving an enduring Republican electoral realignment. Today, the South is
again solid, but the reliable support is for Republican
presidential candidates. Exit polls in 2004 showed that Bush led
Kerry 70 percent to 30 percent among whites, who constituted 71
percent of the Southern voters. Kerry had a 90-percent-to-9-percent
lead among the 18 percent of the voters who were black. One third
of the Southerners said they were white evangelicals; they voted
for Bush, 80 percent to 20 percent.
Reagan to Bush: 1980–2009
The Reagan Era
Ronald Reagan produced a major
realignment with his
1980 and
1984 landslides. In 1980,
the
Reagan coalition was possible
because of
Democratic losses in most
social-economic groups. In 1984, Reagan won nearly 60% of the
popular vote and carried every state except his Democratic opponent
Walter Mondale's home state of
Minnesota and the District of Columbia, creating a record 525
electoral vote total (of 538 possible). Even in Minnesota, Mondale
won by a mere 3,761 votes, meaning Reagan came within less than
3,800 votes of winning in all fifty states.
Political commentators, trying to explain how Reagan had won by
such a large margin, coined the term "
Reagan Democrat" to describe a Democratic
voter who had voted for Reagan in 1980 and 1984 (and for
George H.W. Bush in 1988), producing their landslide
victories. They were mostly white,
blue-collar, and were attracted to
Reagan's social conservatism on issues such as abortion, and to his
hawkish foreign policy.
Stan
Greenberg, a Democratic pollster, concluded that Reagan
Democrats no longer saw Democrats as champions of their middle
class aspirations, but instead saw it as being a party working
primarily for the benefit of others, especially
African Americans and social
liberals.
Reagan reoriented American politics. He claimed credit in 1984 for
an economic renewal—“It's morning in America again!” was the
successful campaign slogan. Income taxes were slashed 25% and the
punitive rates abolished. The frustrations of
stagflation were resolved, as no longer did
soaring inflation and recession pull the country down. Working
again in bipartisan fashion, the Social Security financial crises
were resolved for the next 25 years. Reagan chose not speak
publicly about the HIV-AIDS epidemic until 1987.
In foreign affairs, bipartisanship was not in evidence.
Most
Democrats doggedly opposed Reagan's efforts to support the Contra guerrillas against the Sandinista government of Nicaragua
, and to support the dictatorial governments of Guatemala, Honduras
and El Salvador
against Communist guerrilla movements. He took a hard line
against the Soviet
Union
, alarming Democrats who wanted a nuclear freeze,
but he succeeded in increasing the military budget and launching
the Strategic Defense
Initiative (SDI)—labeled "Star Wars" by its opponents—that the
Soviets could not match. When
Mikhail Gorbachev came to power in Moscow,
many conservative Republicans were dubious of the growing
friendship between him and Reagan. Gorbachev tried to save
communism in
Russia first by ending
the expensive arms race with America, then (1989) by shedding the
East European empire.
Communism finally
collapsed in Russia
in
1991. President
George H.
W. Bush, Reagan's successor, tried to temper
feelings of triumphalism lest there be a backlash in Russia, but
the palpable sense of victory in the
Cold
War was a success that Republicans felt validated the
aggressive foreign policies Reagan had espoused. As Haynes Johnson,
one of his harshest critics admitted, "His greatest service was in
restoring the respect of Americans for themselves and their own
government after the traumas of
Vietnam
and
Watergate, the frustration of
the
Iran hostage crisis and a
succession of seemingly failed presidencies."
Congressional ascendancy in 1994
After the election of Democratic President
Bill Clinton in 1992, the Republican Party, led
by House Republican Minority Whip
Newt
Gingrich campaigning on a
Contract With America, were
elected to majorities to both houses of Congress in the
Republican Revolution of 1994. It was
the first time since 1952 that the Republicans secured control of
both houses of
U.S.
Congress, which, with
the exception of the Senate during 2001-2002, was retained through
2006. This capture and subsequent holding of Congress represented a
major legislative turnaround, as Democrats controlled both houses
of Congress for the forty years preceding 1995, with the exception
of the 1981-1987 Congress in which Republicans controlled the
Senate.
In 1994, Republican Congressional candidates ran on a platform of
major reforms of government with measures such as a
balanced budget amendment and
welfare reform. These measures and
others formed the famous Contract with America, which represented
the first effort to have a party platform in an off-year election.
The Republicans passed some of their proposals, but failed on
others such as
term limits. Democratic
President
Bill Clinton opposed some of
the social agenda initiatives but he co-opted the proposals for
welfare reform and a balanced federal
budget. The result was a major change in the welfare system, which
conservatives hailed and liberals bemoaned. The
Republican-controlled House of Representatives failed to muster the
two-thirds majority required to pass a Constitutional amendment to
impose
term limits on members of
Congress. In 1995, a budget battle with Clinton led to the brief
shutdown of the federal government, an event which contributed to
Clinton's victory in the
1996 election. That year,
the Republicans nominated
Bob Dole, who was
unable to transfer his success in Senate leadership to a viable
presidential campaign, likely due to Newt Gingrich and the
Republican Congress' unpopularity after the budget battle.
The Second Bush Era
George W. Bush, son of former president
George H. W. Bush
(1989-1993), won the 2000 Republican presidential nomination over
his competitors, Arizona Senator
John
McCain, former
Transportation
Secretary,
Labor
Secretary Elizabeth Dole, and
others.
With his victory in the 2000 election
against the Vice President Al Gore of the
Democratic Party, the Republican Party gained control of the
Presidency and both houses of Congress for the first time since
1952, only to lose control of the Senate by one vote when Vermont
Senator James
Jeffords left the Republican Party to become an independent in
2001 and chose to vote with the Democratic caucus.
In the wake of the
September
11, 2001 attacks on the United States, Bush gained widespread
political support as he pursued the
War
on Terrorism that included the
invasion of
Afghanistan and the
invasion
of Iraq. In March 2003, Bush ordered for an invasion of Iraq
because of intelligence alleging the possession of
weapons of mass destruction.
Bush had near-unanimous Republican support in Congress plus support
from many Democratic leaders.
The Republican Party fared well in the 2002
midterm elections, solidifying its hold on
the House and regaining control of the Senate, in the run-up to the
war in Iraq. This marked the first time since 1934 that the party
in control of the White House gained seats in a midterm election in
both houses of Congress. (Previous occasions were in 1902 and
following the
Civil War.) Bush
was renominated without opposition as the Republican candidate in
the
2004 election,
and titled his political platform "A Safer World and a More Hopeful
America." It expressed Bush's optimism towards winning the War on
Terrorism, ushering in an
ownership
society, and building an innovative economy to compete in the
world. Bush was re-elected by a slightly larger margin than in
2000, and Republicans gained seats in both houses of Congress. Bush
told reporters "I earned capital in the campaign, political
capital, and now I intend to spend it. It is my style."
He announced his agenda in January 2005, but his popularity in the
polls waned and his troubles mounted. Failure to find
Weapons of Mass Destruction in
Iraq and mounting combat casualties led popular support for his
policies to fall. His campaign to add personal savings accounts to
the
Social Security
system and make major revisions in the tax code were postponed. He
succeeded in selecting conservatives to head four of the most
important agencies,
Condoleezza
Rice as
Secretary of State,
Alberto Gonzales as
Attorney General,
John Roberts as
Chief Justice of the United
States and
Ben Bernanke as
Chairman of the Federal
Reserve. He failed to win conservative approval for
Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, replacing
her with
Samuel Alito, whom the Senate
confirmed in January 2006. Bush and McCain secured additional tax
cuts and blocked moves to raise taxes. Through 2006, they strongly
defended his policy in Iraq, saying the
Coalition was winning. They secured
the renewal of the
USA PATRIOT
Act.
In the November 2005 off-year elections, New York City, Republican
mayoral candidate
Michael
Bloomberg won a landslide re-election, the fourth straight
Republican victory in what is otherwise a Democratic stronghold. In
California, Governor
Arnold
Schwarzenegger failed in his effort to use the ballot
initiative to enact laws the Democrats blocked in the state
legislature.
Scandals prompted the resignations of Congressional Republicans
House Majority Leader Tom DeLay,
Duke
Cunningham,
Mark Foley, and
Bob Ney. In the
2006 midterm elections, the
Republicans lost control of both the House of Representatives and
Senate for the
110th Congress to the
Democrats. Exit polling suggested that corruption was a key issue
for many voters.
In the Republican leadership elections that followed the general
election, Speaker Hastert did not run and Republicans chose
John Boehner of Ohio for
House Minority Leader. Senators chose
whip
Mitch McConnell of Kentucky for
Senate Minority Leader, and
chose their former leader
Trent Lott as
Senate Minority Whip by one
vote over
Lamar Alexander, who
assumed their roles in January, 2007.
In the October and
November gubernatorial elections of 2007, Republican Bobby Jindal won election for governor of
Louisiana
, Republican incumbent Governor Ernie Fletcher of Kentucky
lost, and Republican incumbent Governor Haley Barbour of Mississippi
won re-election.
With President
George W. Bush of the party ineligible for a third term
and Vice President
Dick Cheney not
pursuing their party's nomination, Arizona Senator
John McCain quickly emerged as the Republican
Party's presidential nominee, receiving President Bush's
endorsement on March 6, six months before official ratification at
the
2008 Republican
National Convention. On August 29 Sen. McCain announced
Governor
Sarah Palin of Alaska as his
running-mate, making her the first woman on a Republican
Presidential ticket. They went on to lose the election to Democrat
Barack Obama and his running-mate,
Joe Biden.
Post-Second Bush era
Following the 2008 elections, the Republican party had suffered
several significant defeats, losing control of the presidency and
of congress. The 2006 midterm elections returned control of the
House of Representatives to the Democrats for the first time since
1994. The Republicans also lost ground in the Senate, barely
maintaining the 41 seats needed to sustain a filibuster, although
this changed when
Arlen Specter
switched to the Democratic Party. Many national polls of
Republicans consider the party to be with no clear "leader". Many
different
potential presidential candidates for the 2012 elections have
been suggested.
In the 2009 elections, Republicans were successful in the New
Jersey and Virginia gubernatorial elections, but lost
New York's 23rd
congressional district.
See also
Notes
- Foner, Eric. Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men. Oxford,
1993.
- There is also a myth that the town of Exeter, New Hampshire was
first by six months, but nothing came of the secret meeting there
and scholars dismiss the claim.
- The Origins of the Republican Party
- Gould 2003
- Kleppner (1979) has extensive detail on the voting behavior of
groups.
- Goldwyn 2005.
- Woolfolk p. 134.
- DeSantis 1998.
- Shafer and Badger (2001)
- Paul Kleppner, The Third Electoral System 1853-1892
(1979) p 182
- Kleppner 1979
- Kleppner 1979.
- Everett Carll Ladd Jr. Where Have All the Voters Gone? The
Fracturing of America's Political Parties (1978) p.6
- The unicameral Nebraska legislature, in fact controlled by the
Republicans, is technically nonpartisan.
- CNN.com Election 2004
- Johnson, Haynes (1989). Sleepwalking Through History:
America in the Reagan Years. 28.
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