Republican Party (United States)

The Republican Party (RNC), also known as the Grand Old Party (GOP), is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States of America, along with the Democratic Party, created in March 1854 for the purpose of limiting slavery from the United States. It became one of the two main political parties of the United States in the 1860s, when its first US President Abraham Lincoln was elected and when a Republican government won the American Civil War and abolished slavery.

What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried? We stick to, contend for, the identical old policy on the point in controversy which was adopted by our fathers who framed the government under which we live. ~ Abraham Lincoln

This gallant old party, this gallant old ship! ~ John Logan

Most people who are successful are Republican. That's just a fact of life. ~ William Daley

I'm from the party of Abraham Lincoln. The only flag I want to salute is the American flag. ~ Scott Pinsker

We are Republicans. But we are Americans first. ~ Margaret Chase Smith

The Republican Party has stood for a certain free market version of America, an America that's about openness, that’s about markets, that's about opportunity, and a definition of what this country is. ~ David Brooks

Equality under law promises more than the equal right to vote and transcends mere relief from discrimination by government. It becomes a reality only when all persons have equal opportunity, without distinction of race, religion, color or national origin, to acquire the essentials of life—housing, education and employment. The Republican Party, the party of Abraham Lincoln, from its very beginning has striven to make this promise a reality. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1960

Free men look to us for leadership and support, which we dedicate ourselves to give out of the abundance of our national strength. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1960

For Lincoln, as for most Republicans, antislavery action meant not attacking slavery where it was but working to prevent slavery's westward expansion. Lincoln, however, did talk about a future without slavery. The aim of the Republican Party, he insisted, was to put the institution on the road to 'ultimate extinction'. ~ Eric Foner

Devotion to Republicanism does not imply apostasy from truth. ~ Frank Abial Flower

Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work, and then they get elected and prove it. ~ P.J. O'Rourke

Under various names, led by a purer patriotism far in advance of the different political organizations to which they had belonged, they continued to grow in numbers and influence, until, composing a majority of their respective communities in this republic, they were, in response to an inexorable law, drawn into one great spirited army, with a common purpose. Equal and perpetual freedom for all! And a common name. Republican. ~ Frank Abial Flower

Of all the political organizations in America, none has had so hard a struggle for national existence as that known as the Republican Party of today; nor has any political party in any country or age achieved so much for the advance of human liberty and the elevation upon a common platform of the religious and civil equality of all men before the law. ~ Rolander Guy Mcclellan

Republicanism is the religion of a nation; it creates imperial commonwealths out of desert wastes. These 'imperial commonwealths' constitute the foremost nation of the earth. The American republic. It leads them all. ~ Frank Abial Flower

We hold the beacon of civil liberty and personal equality higher than any other. ~ Frank Abial Flower

The light of our civilization goes farther into the jungles of ignorance and barbarism, deeper into the dungeons of tyranny and oppression than that of any other people. We are the load-stone of nations, the guiding star of the world. We have achieved this proud position since the great Republican Party came into power. All these glories are the result of its policy, the offspring of its principles. ~ Frank Abial Flower

If the Republican Party of this nation shall ever have the national house entrusted to its keeping, it will be the duty of that party to attend to all the affairs of national housekeeping. Whatever matters of importance may come up, whatever difficulties may arise in the way of its administration of the government, that party will then have to attend to. ~ Abraham Lincoln

I see the signs of the approaching triumph of the Republicans in the bearing of their political adversaries. A great deal of their war with us nowadays is mere bushwhacking. ~ Abraham Lincoln

It is true that in the organization of the Republican Party this question of slavery was more important than any other; indeed, so much more important has it become that no other national question can even get a hearing just at present. ~ Abraham Lincoln

We think slavery is wrong and ought to be restricted. ~ Abraham Lincoln

Its mission is as vitally important as ever. It must guard and protect the people's treasures. For the finer and richer the garden, the more rank will be it growth of weeds when left without the gardener's case. ~ Frank Abial Flower

If the Republicans, who think slavery is wrong, get possession of the general government, we may not root out the evil at once, but may at least prevent its extension. If I find a venomous snake lying on the open praire, I seize the first stick and kill him at once. But if that snake is in bed with my children, I must be more cautious. I shall, in striking the snake, also strike the children, or arouse the reptile to bite the children. Slavery is the venomous snake in bed with the children. ~ Abraham Lincoln

The spirit of the Republican Party does not know white man or black man. All stand equal before it, as they should stand equal before the law. ~ John M. Langston

The suggestion of denying any measure of their full political rights to such a great group of our population as the colored people is one which, however it might be received in some other quarters, could not possibly be permitted by one who feels a responsibility for living up to the traditions and maintaining the principles of the Republican Party. ~ Calvin Coolidge

I do not want Americans of foreign birth making their party alignments on what we mean to do for some nation in the old world. We want them to be Republican because of what we mean to do for the United States of America. Our call is for unison, not rivaling sympathies. Our need is concord. ~ Warren G. Harding

There should never be a day in the United States of America when people are excluded based solely on their race or religion. It is un-Republican. ~ Jennifer Horn

The Republicans inculcate, with whatever of ability they can, that the negro is a man; that his bondage is cruelly wrong, and that the field of his oppression ought not to be enlarged. ~ Abraham Lincoln

Only Grant and his Republican Party, the party of Lincoln, could keep America's promise of equal rights for all men. Lincoln had been the first president to invite Negro participation in the inaugural pageant. Grant was the second. But for Grant, freedom and equal rights were matters of principle, not symbolism. More than even the most progressive-minded white Americans of his time, he rejected prejudice. He knew his soldiers had sacrificed not only to hold the nation together, but also to make men free. He did not want those sacrifices to have been in vain. ~ Charles Lane

Equality of individuals before the law has always been a cornerstone of our party. We therefore oppose discrimination based on sex, race, age, religion, creed, disability, or national origin and will vigorously enforce anti-discrimination statutes. As we strive to forge a national consensus on the crucial issues of our time, we call on all Americans to reject the forces of hatred and bigotry. Accordingly, we denounce all who practice or promote racism, antisemitism, ethnic prejudice, and religious intolerance. Our country was founded in faith and upon the truth that self-government is rooted. ~ Republican Party Platform of 2000

The time has come for equality of opportunity in sharing in government, in education, and in employment. It will not be stayed or denied. It is here! ~ Everett Dirksen

Individual rights, and the responsibilities that go with them, are the foundation of a free society. From the time of Lincoln, equality of individuals has been a cornerstone of the Republican Party. ~ Republican Party Platform of 2008

We consider discrimination based on sex, race, age, religion, creed, disability, or national origin to be immoral, and we will strongly enforce anti-discrimination statutes. We ask all to join us in rejecting the forces of hatred and bigotry and in denouncing all who practice or promote racism. ~ Republican Party Platform of 2008

The elements of which the Republican Party was composed gave better ground for the ultimate hope of the success of the colored man's cause than those of the Democratic Party. ~ Frederick Douglass

We pledge continued opposition to discrimination based on race, creed, national origin, or sex. We recognize that the elimination of any such discrimination is a matter of heart, conscience, and education, as well as of equal rights under law. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1964

Law requires equal rights, and it is our policy to end discrimination on account of sex, race, color, creed, or national origin. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1984

The Republican Party has unequivocally recognized that the supreme law of the land is embodied in the constitution, which guarantees to all people the blessings of liberty, due process and equal protection of the laws. It confers upon all native-born and naturalized citizens not only citizenship in the state where the individual resides but citizenship of the United States as well. This is an unqualified right, regardless of race, creed, or color. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1956

The Republican Party points to an impressive record of accomplishment in the field of civil rights and commits itself anew to advancing the rights of all our people regardless of race, creed, color or national origin. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1956

A Republican administration will not endorse situations or constitutions, in whatever society, which are racist in purpose or in effect. It will not expect miracles, but will press for genuine progress in achieving goals consistent with American ideals. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1980

Free speech on college campuses is to be celebrated, but there should be no place in academia for antisemitism or racism, of any kind. ~ Republican Party Platform of 2008

A multi-racial society with guarantees of individual rights is possible and can work. We must remain open and helpful to all parties. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1980

I recognize the Republican Party as the sheet anchor of the colored man's political hopes and the ark of his safety. ~ Frederick Douglass

Under existing conditions the Negro votes the Republican ticket because he knows his friends are of that party. Many a good citizen votes the opposite, not because he agrees with the great principles of state which separate parties, but because, generally, he is opposed to negro rule. This is a most delusive cry. Treat the negro as a citizen and a voter, as he is and must remain, and soon parties will be divided, not on the color line, but on principle. ~ Ulysses S. Grant

Our nation is a land of opportunity for all, and our communities must represent the ideal of equality and justice for every citizen. The Republican Party favors aggressive, proactive measures to ensure that no individual is discriminated against on the basis of race. ~ Republican Party Platform of 2004

We are the party of individual Americans, whose rights we protect and defend as the foundation for opportunity and security for all. Today, as at our founding in the day of Lincoln, we insist no one's rights are negotiable. As we strive to forge a national consensus on the divisive issues of our time, we call on all Republicans and all Americans to reject the forces of hatred and bigotry. Accordingly, we denounce all who practice or promote racism. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1996

The protection of individual rights is the foundation for opportunity and security. The Republican Party is unique in this regard. Since its inception, it has respected every person, even when that proposition was not universally popular. Today, as in the day of Lincoln, we insist that no American's rights are negotiable. That is why we declare that bigotry and prejudice have no place in American life. We denounce all who practice or promote racism. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1992

The founding ideals of our nation, and in fact the founding ideals of the political party I represent, was and remains today the equal dignity and equal rights of every American. ~ George W. Bush

Americans critically need, and are eager for, new and dynamic leadership. We offer that leadership; a leadership to eradicate bitterness and discrimination. ~ Republican Platform of 1968

When the chips are down and the decisions are made as to who the candidates will be, then the 11th commandment prevails and everybody goes to work, and that is: Thou shalt not speak ill of another Republican. ~ Ronald Reagan

Since its inception, the Republican Party has stood for the worth of every person. On that ground, we support the pluralism and diversity that have been part of our country's greatness. Deep in our hearts, we do believe that bigotry has no place in American life. We denounce those persons, organizations, publications, and movements which practice or promote racism. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1988

Equality of individuals before the law has always been a cornerstone of our party. We therefore oppose discrimination based on sex, race, age, religion, creed, disability, or national origin and will vigorously enforce anti-discrimination statutes. As we strive to forge a national consensus on the crucial issues of our time, we call on all Americans to reject the forces of hatred and bigotry. Accordingly, we denounce all who practice or promote racism. ~ Republican Party Platform of 2000

We do want a law enacted that we may be recognized like other men in the country. Why is it that colored members of Congress cannot enjoy the same immunities that are accorded to white members? Why cannot we stop at hotels here without meeting objection? Why cannot we go into restaurants without being insulted? We are here enacting laws for the country and casting votes upon important questions; we have been sent here by the suffrages of the people, and why cannot we enjoy the same benefits that are accorded to our white colleagues on this floor? ~ Joseph Hayne Rainey

Discrimination against the negro race in this country is unjust, is unworthy of a high-minded people whose example should have a salutary influence in the world. ~ Joseph Hayne Rainey

This nation was created to give expression, validity and purpose to our spiritual heritage—the supreme worth of the individual. In such a nation—a nation dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal—racial discrimination has no place. It can hardly be reconciled with a Constitution that guarantees equal protection under law to all persons. In a deeper sense, too, it is immoral and unjust. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1960

We pledge to help assure equal opportunity and a good education for all. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1964

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The Republican Party is the party of the open door. Ours is the party of liberty, the party of equality, of opportunity for all, and favoritism for none. ~ The Rules of the Republican Party

No individual should be victimized by unfair discrimination because of race, sex, advanced age, physical handicap, difference of national origin or religion, or economic circumstance. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1980

Participation in a Republican primary, caucus, or any meeting or convention held for the purpose of electing, selecting, allocating, or binding delegates and alternate delegates to a county, district, state, or national convention shall in no way be abridged for reasons of sex, race, religion, color, age, or national origin. ~ The Rules of the Republican Party

We will work toward ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment, appointment of women to highest level positions in the federal government, including the cabinet and supreme court, equal pay for equal work, elimination of discrimination against women at all levels in the federal government, elimination of discrimination against women in the criminal justice system, in sentencing, rehabilitation and prison facilities, increased opportunities for the part time employment of women, and expanded training programs for women. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1972

As the 'Party of Lincoln', we remain equally and steadfastly committed to the equality of rights for all citizens, regardless of race. Although this nation has not yet eliminated all vestiges of racism over the years we are heartened by the progress that has been made, we are proud of the role that our party has played, and we are dedicated to standing shoulder to shoulder with black Americans in that cause. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1980

A new political party. They called themselves the Republican Party. Their primary goal and mission was to end slavery and give blacks the same rights afforded to white citizens. ~ Wayne Perryman

On the issue of slavery, Democrats fought for and gave their lives to expand it while Republicans fought and gave their lives to ban it. ~ Wayne Perryman

The Republican Party reaffirms its support of the pluralism and freedom that have been part and parcel of this great country. In so doing, it repudiates and completely disassociates itself from people, organizations, publications, and entities which promulgate the practice of any form of bigotry, racism, antisemitism, or religious intolerance. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1984

Equal rights for men and women; we favor legislation assuring equal pay for equal work regardless of sex. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1952

Through our efforts, de jure segregation is virtually ended. We pledge continuation of these efforts until no American schoolchild suffers educational deprivation because of the color of his skin or the language he speaks and all school children are receiving high quality education. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1972

Immigration, which in the past has added so much to the wealth, development of resources and increase of power to the nation, the asylum of the oppressed of all nations, should be fostered and encouraged by a liberal and just policy. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1864

The Republican Party includes Americans from every faith and tradition, and our policies and positions respect the right of every American to follow his or her beliefs and underscore our reverence for the religious freedom envisioned by the founding fathers of our nation and of our party. ~ Republican Party Platform of 2012

Human slavery... The Democratic Party taught that it was divine; God's institution. They defended it, they stood around it, they followed it to its grave as a mourner. But here it lies, dead by the hand of Abraham Lincoln; dead by the power of the Republican Party, dead by the justice of Almighty God. ~ James A. Garfield

We favor strengthening our common American identity and loyalty, which includes the contribution and assimilation of different racial and ethnic groups. ~ Texan Republican Party Platform of 2014

We shall ever build anew, that our children and their children, without distinction because of race, creed or color, may know the blessings of our free land. ~ Republican Party Platform of 1956

All Americans stand equal before the law. We embrace the principle that all Americans should be treated with respect and dignity. In the spirit of the constitution, we consider discrimination based on sex, race, age, religion, creed, disability, or national origin unacceptable and immoral. We will strongly enforce anti-discrimination statutes and ask all to join us in rejecting the forces of hatred. ~ Republican Party Platform of 2012

I am a Republican, a black, dyed in the wool Republican, and I never intend to belong to any other party than the party of freedom and progress. ~ Frederick Douglass

We uphold the right of individual Americans to own firearms, a right which antedated the constitution and was solemnly confirmed by the Second Amendment. ~ Republican Party Platform of 2008

Gun ownership is responsible citizenship, enabling Americans to defend themselves, their property, and communities. ~ Republican Party Platform of 2008

In 1854, the Whig Party collapsed and the Republican Party was born. The Republicans were the anti-slavery party. ~ Bryan Preston

Of the two, the Republicans were clearly the party that sought to abolish slavery. The Democrats have no claim at all to supporting civil rights at that time. The election of Republican abolition supporter Abraham Lincoln in 1860 was met by the southern Democrats with secession. The Democrats started a war to divide the country in order to preserve slavery. ~ Bryan Preston

On March 20, 1854, the Republican Party was established in Ripon, Wisconsin. Referred to as the 'GOP' or 'Grand Old Party', it established for one reason, to break the chains of slavery and ensure the unalienable rights endowed by the Creator of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness would be for all Americans. The Republican Party was created to achieve individual freedom. Then, as now. ~ Allen Bernard West

To win in the 21st century, the Party of Lincoln needs to start looking like the Party of Lincoln again. ~ John P. Avlon

When Van Jones called the Republicans assholes, he was paying them a compliment. He was talking about how they can get things done even when they're in the minority. ~ Bill Maher

Songs such as 'Nigger Doodle Dandy' reflect the racist tone of the Democrats' presidential campaign in 1864. How did Republicans counter? In part, they sought white votes by being anti-racist. The Republican campaign, boosted by military victories in the fall of 1864, proved effective. The Democrats' overt appeals to racism failed, and anti-racist Republicans triumphed almost everywhere. ~ James Loewen

The Republican Party has told the black man to go to hell. I offer them a similar invitation. ~ Jackie Robinson

The party has a right-wing platform favoring economically liberal and socially conservative policies. It currently controls the House of Representatives, the lower chamber of the United States Congress, as well as numerous state governments.

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Quotes

A

• Whoever cracked Thaddeus Stevens' skull would let out the brains of the Republican Party.
  • Anonymous saying, quoted in Thaddeus Stevens, Scourge of the South (1959) by Frawn M. Brodie, p. 63

• If the Republican Party with its platform of principles, the main feature of which is the abolition of slavery and, therefore, the destruction of the South, carries the country at the next Presidential election, shall we remain in the Union, or form a separate Confederacy? This is the great, grave issue. It is not who shall be President, it is not which party shall rule – it is a question of political and social existence.
  • Alfred Aldrich, as quoted in Crisis of Fear, by Steven Channing, pp. 141–142

• The GOP finally became the region's dominant party in the least racist phase of the south's entire history, and it got that way by attracting most of its votes from the region's growing and confident communities, not its declining and fearful ones... Most Republicans genuinely believe that a color-blind society lies down the road of individual choice and dynamic change, not down the road of state regulation and unequal treatment before the law.
  • Gerard Alexander, "The Myth of the Racist Republicans" (March 20, 2004), The Claremont Institute

• The overwhelming majority of Republicans think that poor people, who maybe are getting food stamps or some kind of public assistance, are lazy and life is easy for them. It’s like they’re just living in a hammock. Now, anyone who’s actually been poor knows that it’s in fact a lot of work to be poor, just getting the daily subsistence, and often they’re keeping down three part-time jobs. They can’t get full-time hours anywhere, and it’s enormously difficult just to pay for basic necessities.
  • Elizabeth S. Anderson, "Why work is so miserable in America: The Protestant work ethic hijacked America. It’s time for a new pro-worker ethos." Vox (February 11, 2024)

• What a pleasant lot of fellows they are. What a pity they have so little sense about politics. If they lived north the last one of them would be Republicans.
  • Chester A. Arthur, as quoted in Recollections of Thirteen Presidents (1906), by John S. Wise

• You start out in 1954 by saying, 'Nigger, nigger, nigger.' By 1968 you can't say 'nigger'—that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like forced busing, states' rights and all that stuff. You're getting so abstract now [that] you're talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you're talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is [that] blacks get hurt worse than whites. And subconsciously maybe that is part of it. I'm not saying that. But I'm saying that if it is getting that abstract, and that coded, that we are doing away with the racial problem one way or the other. You follow me—because obviously sitting around saying, 'We want to cut this,' is much more abstract than even the busing thing, and a hell of a lot more abstract than 'Nigger, nigger.'
  • Lee Atwater, in 1981, as quoted in The Two Party South (1990), by Alexander P. Lamis, et al., New York: Oxford University Press
  • Also quoted in "Impossible, Ridiculous, Repugnant" (October 6, 2005), by Bob Herbert, The New York Times, New York: New York Times Company

• In an under-remarked historic irony, the political party that long defended slavery and racial segregation has become the first to nominate an African-American for president. And the GOP, the Party of Lincoln, which fought for union and advanced civil rights from Reconstruction to Little Rock, has been left with a troubling lack of diversity on its political bench. The Republican Party was right on civil rights for the first one-hundred years of its existence. It was right when the Democratic Party was wrong. Its future strength and survival will depend on rediscovering that legacy of individual freedom amid America's essential diversity. To win in the 21st century, the 'Party of Lincoln' needs to start looking like the 'Party of Lincoln' again.
  • John P. Avlon, "How the Party of Lincoln was Left Behind on Civil Rights" (June 20, 2008), Real Clear Politics

• The decision came from what seemed to many white Virginians the unavoidable logic of the situation. Virginia was a slave state; the Republicans had announced their intention of limiting slavery. Slavery was protected by the sovereignty of the state.
  • Edward Ayers, as quoted in In the Presence of Mine Enemies: The Civil War in the Heart of America 1859-1863 (2003), p. 141

B

• What would happen to the Democratic Party if they were to lose the election this year? The same thing that happened to it the last time it lost. It would sit in the wings until the Republican Party wiped itself out again.
  • Russell Baker, "Observer: The Democrats in a Nutshell", The New York Times (August 22, 1968) Baker's predictions came true with appearance of the New Covenant and the New New Deal

• The right doesn’t dislike @AOC because she's ineffective. They despise her precisely because she communicates boldly, passionately and in a Twitter-native manner. When AOC talks, Republicans know they are losing.
• Stop the handwringing about @aoc and concentration camps. First of all, she's right. Second of all, she has single-handedly forced a debate about the barbaric and inhumane treatment of migrants at our Southern Border. She is smart, moral and correct.
  • Krystal Ball inTwitter Posts, (June 19 & 21, 2019)

• I was always raised to think that Republicans were about limited government, about individual liberty, about fiscal responsibility, about balanced budgets, about a wariness of military adventures abroad, about responsible encouragement to business. There's a whole list of things I thought the Republican Party was all about, and these guys that presently occupy the White House, are categorically against every single one of those things. So if they're Republicans, I'm not. But I'm really not a very comfortable Democrat. I mean the Democrats in the last elections proved themselves to be a bunch of dithering pussies... and it was pathetic. So I'm just waiting until one party or the other actually gets a moral compass and a backbone.
  • John Perry Barlow, "John Perry Barlow: Wyoming's Estimated Prophet: Interview with Aaron Davis", Planet J.H. Weekly (July 28, 2005)

• Like all Republicans, I knew that my party was founded in opposition to slavery. But I hadn't understood why this was so necessary until I came to realize how deeply entranced racism was in Congress and just how critical the power of the south was in presidential politics... McCarthy was a Republican. The Democrats, however, have skeletons in their own closet and it's worth remembering them, too. For example, Democrat Woodrow Wilson's Attorney General, A. Mitchell Palmer, who was just as rabid an anti-Communist as McCarthy, did far more to repress free speech and political freedom than McCarthy ever attempted. It wasn't a Republican president who locked up thousands of loyal Americans of Japanese descent in concentration camps for years. It was Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt. And it wasn't a Republican who wiretapped and snooped on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., but Democrats John F. Kennedy and his brother Robert, who signed the order as Attorney General.
  • Bruce Bartlett, Wrong on Race: The Democratic Party's Buried Past (2008), pp. x–xi

• They may not be the quasi-racists that they are often made out to be in the mainstream media, but neither have they made any real effort to reach out African Americans, politically, for a long time. This bad for the Republican Party, bad for black people, and bad for the country. It would be much better for everyone if the black vote was 'in play' and both major parities had to compete for it. As virtual captives of the Democrats since 1936, blacks have ended up being taken for granted by them and mostly ignored by Republicans... I think Republicans should fight for the black vote and blacks should fight for a place in the Republican Party, just as they fought for their civil rights in the last century. It's a necessary thing and each may find more in common with the other than they imagine. Blacks will be in a far stronger position if both parties must compete for their votes... I would urge Republicans to do as I have done and study this nation's racial history. They need to know, I mean really know, things about slavery and racism that they think they know, but really don't. It will make it easier for them to empathize with African Americans, who have really suffered very badly during most of their history in this country in ways that the nation has barely started to acknowledge, let alone compensate for. For too long, white America has taken the view that it is sufficient simply to stop being racist to make things right for blacks. But the long, long legacy of past racism has never been redressed by either party.
  • Bruce Bartlett, Wrong on Race: The Democratic Party's Buried Past (2008), pp. xiii–xiv

• Until conservatives once again hold Republicans to the same standard they hold Democrats, they will have no credibility and deserve no respect. They can start building some by admitting to themselves that.
  • Bruce Bartlett, "The GOP's Misplaced Rage" The Daily Beast (August 12, 2009)

• President Abraham Lincoln died more than 150 years ago. The "Solid South" was so enraged at him for beating them in the Civil War and at his party for ending slavery that they voted Democrat for the next 100 years. Then the Democrats started supporting civil rights for people of colour. The Republicans saw the opportunity, courted them and flipped them. The Solid South is now theirs. It has been a long time since the Republican Party has been "the party of Lincoln". Let us put that aside. Is the GOP still the "party of Reagan"? Oh, very much so. And I was recently reminded exactly how much while re-reading a book I wrote during his presidency back in the 1980s: "You Get What You Pay For". As I flipped through the pages, I found myself saying, over and over again, "that's just like Trump". [...] Joe constantly points out that Trump started his campaign with racism, riding down the escalator, attacking Mexicans. Joe thinks this illustrates a difference. Ronald Reagan also started his presidential campaign with racism. He chose to make his kick-off speech in the heart of the Solid South, in Mississippi, quite near where three civil rights workers had been murdered. He said, "I believe in states' rights." It was the biggest dog whistle of the day, code for segregation, and the crowd cheered. He continued: "... we have distorted the balance of our government today by giving powers that were never intended to be given in the Constitution to that federal establishment." It had been the Republican Party that had tried to impose integration after the Civil War. Reagan was making it clear that his party was completely divorcing itself from Lincoln's vision. It was not a one-off. Reagan ran against the "welfare queens" and against "the strapping bucks" who stood in front of you at the supermarket, buying steaks with food stamps, while you made do with hamburger helper, earned by the honest sweat of your brow. It was a brilliant strategy that turned government programmes into handouts to minorities with money stolen - through taxes - from good white people. It was called the Southern Strategy. Reagan did not invent it. But he sold it with warmth, charm, and a smile. [...] Trump may be vulgar, Trump may be abrasive, but in terms of racism, corruption, and destruction, he is Mr Reagan's true heir. Trump's Republican Party is what it has been at least since the 1980s, only more so.
  • Larry Beinhart, Donald and Ronald Al Jazeera English (August 12, 2019).

• The 'discovery' is made that although slaves were emancipated, race relations did not essentially change. In this interpretation, slavery becomes the dependent variable in the historical equation. Racism is the independent variable, the enduring value in American politics and society. From this perspective, the motives of the free soil and antislavery movements are questioned on the ground of self-interest and denied genuine moral standing. Defense of the Union is divorced from the antebellum controversy over the extension of slavery into the territories. Abstracted from the ideology and aims of the Republican Party, the goal of preserving the Union is viewed simply as a project for aggrandizing national power; a project that includes permanent defense of existing slavery. Meaningful antislavery motives are attributed only to slaves, who in recent accounts are viewed as principally responsible for initiating the process of emancipation. Lincoln and the Union high command, their vision clouded by racial conservatism, stand in need of instruction in the ways of genuinely higher moral purpose by the slaves themselves, whose flight to freedom transformed the war for the Union into an abolitionist crusade.
  • Herman Belz, "Review Essay" (2004), Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association, University of Illinois Press

• The Republican party of the north hates slavery... The Republican Party is the permanent, dominant party at the north, and it is vain to think that you can put it down. It is true that the Republican Party hates slavery, and that it is to be the permanent, dominant party at the north; and the majority being equivalent to the whole, as I have already stated, we cannot doubt the result.
  • Henry Benning, speech to the Virginian secession convention (18 February 1861), as quoted in "Why Non-Slaveholding Southeners Fought: Address to the Charleston Library Society" (January 2011), by Gordon Rhea, Civil War Trust. Also quoted in Proceedings of the Virginia State Convention of 1861, vol. 1, pp. 62-75

• We got a real clear picture of what they all value. Every Republican's voted for it. Look at what they value and look at their budget and what they're proposing. Romney wants to let the — he said in the first hundred days he’s going to let the big banks once again write their own rules, 'unchain Wall Street'. They're going to put y'all back in chains.
  • Joseph Biden, campaign speech (August 14, 2012), Danville, Virginia

• The Republican Party is experiencing an existential crisis, born of its own misguided incongruity with modern American culture and its insistence on choosing intransigence in a dynamic age of fundamental change.
  • Charles Blow, as quoted in "The G.O.P.'s Bachmann Problem", The New York Times (March 22, 2013)

• To blacks, the GOP was the party of emancipation and opportunity.
  • John B. Boles, A Companion to the American South, p. 496

• He (Ronald Reagan) was pro-free trade and pro-immigration. He believed in limited government at home and American leadership abroad. That's what I believed in too — and that's what I thought the Republican Party stood for.
  • Max Boot The Republican Party is dead. Los Angeles Times (May 8, 2016).

• Republican Party is dead. It was wounded by the tea party absolutists who insisted on political purity and rejected any compromise. Now it has been killed by Donald Trump.
  • Max Boot The Republican Party is dead. Los Angeles Times (May 8, 2016).

• I won't vote for Trump. My hope is that he will lose by a landslide, and the Republican Party will come to its senses, rejecting both his ugly, nativist populism and the extreme, holier-than-thou conservatism represented by Ted Cruz.
  • Max Boot The Republican Party is dead. Los Angeles Times (May 8, 2016).

• It’s hard to know exactly when the Republican Party assumed the mantle of the "stupid party." ... After decades of masquerading as the "stupid party," that’s what it has become. But if an unapologetic ignoramus wins the presidency, the consequences will be no laughing matter.
  • Max Boot How the 'Stupid Party' Created Trump (July 31, 2016).

• There is no evidence that Republican leaders have been demonstrably dumber than their Democratic counterparts. During the Reagan years, the G.O.P. briefly became known as the "party of ideas," because it harvested so effectively the intellectual labor of conservative think tanks. ... In recent years, however, the Republicans’ relationship to the realm of ideas has become more and more attenuated as talk-radio hosts and television personalities have taken over the role of defining the conservative movement that once belonged to thinkers.
  • Max Boot How the 'Stupid Party' Created Trump (July 31, 2016).

• It is genuinely terrifying that someone (Donald Trump) who advances such offensive and ridiculous proposals could win the nomination of a party once led by Teddy Roosevelt, who wrote more books than Mr. Trump has probably read.
  • Max Boot How the 'Stupid Party' Created Trump (July 31, 2016).

• The Republican Party was once the party of small government, free trade, traditional values, principled foreign policy leadership and, most important of all, adherence to the Constitution. Republicans spent decades fulminating against activist judges like Earl Warren and activist politicians like Barack Obama, claiming they were undermining the founders' vision of limited government.
  • Max Boot, "When Will Republicans Stand Up to Trump?" The New York Times (May 12, 2017)

• We went into the little meeting held in a school house Whigs, Free Soilers, and Democrats. We came out of it Republicans and we were the first Republicans in the Union.
  • Alvan Bovay, as quoted in "The cast of Primary Characters involved in the Birth of the Republican Party" (2014), The Little White Schoolhouse

• Republicans bring out Colin Powell and J.C. Watts because they have no program, no policy. The play that game because they have no other game. They have no love and no joy. They'd rather take pictures with black children than feed them.
  • Donna Brazile, Al Gore's campaign manager for the 2000 United States presidential election, as quoted by Ceci Connolly in "Gore Aide Dealt From Bottom of Race Deck, Powell Says" The Washington Post (January 7, 2000)

• The Republican Party has stood for a certain free market version of America, an America that's about openness, that’s about markets, that's about opportunity, and a definition of what this country is.
  • David Brooks, as quoted in "Shields and Brooks on the GOP push to stop Trump" PBS NewsHour (March 4, 2016)

• You used to have John McCain and a lot of Republicans with climate change legislation. And once it became a Democratic issue, the Republicans had to go on the other side.
  • David Brooks, as quoted in Shields and Brooks on Hurricane Harvey unity, climate change politics PBS Newshour (September 1, 2016)

• Rachel Bovard is one of the thousands of smart young Americans who flock to Washington each year to make a difference. She’s worked in the House and Senate for Republicans Rand Paul, Pat Toomey, and Mike Lee, was listed among the “Most Influential Women in Washington Under 35” by National Journal, did a stint at the Heritage Foundation, and is now policy director of the Conservative Partnership Institute, whose mission is to train, equip, and unify the conservative movement. She’s bright, cheerful, and funny, and has a side hustle as a sommelier. And, like most young people, she has absorbed the dominant ideas of her peer group.
  One of the ideas she’s absorbed is that the conservatives who came before her were insufferably naive. They thought liberals and conservatives both want what’s best for America, disagreeing only on how to get there. But that’s not true, she believes. “Woke elites—increasingly the mainstream left of this country—do not want what we want,” she told the National Conservatism Conference, which was held earlier this month in a bland hotel alongside theme parks in Orlando. “What they want is to destroy us,” she said. “Not only will they use every power at their disposal to achieve their goal,” but they’ve already been doing it for years “by dominating every cultural, intellectual, and political institution.”
  As she says this, the dozens of young people in her breakout session begin to vibrate in their seats. Ripples of head nodding are visible from where I sit in the back. These are the rising talents of the right—the Heritage Foundation junior staff, the Ivy League grads, the intellectual Catholics and the Orthodox Jews who have been studying Hobbes and de Tocqueville at the various young conservative fellowship programs that stretch along Acela-land. In the hallway before watching Bovard’s speech, I bumped into one of my former Yale students, who is now at McKinsey.
  Bovard has the place rocking, training her sights on the true enemies, the left-wing elite: a “totalitarian cult of billionaires and bureaucrats, of privilege perpetuated by bullying, empowered by the most sophisticated surveillance and communications technologies in history, and limited only by the scruples of people who arrest rape victims’ fathers, declare math to be white supremacist, finance ethnic cleansing in western China, and who partied, a mile high, on Jeffrey Epstein’s Lolita Express.”
  The atmosphere is electric. She’s giving the best synopsis of national conservatism I’ve heard at the conference we’re attending—and with flair! Progressives pretend to be the oppressed ones, she tells the crowd, “but in reality, it’s just an old boys’ club, another frat house for entitled rich kids contrived to perpetuate their unearned privilege. It’s Skull and Bones for gender-studies majors!” She finishes to a rousing ovation. People leap to their feet.
  I have the sinking sensation that the thunderous sound I’m hearing is the future of the Republican Party.
  • David Brooks, as quoted in "The Terrifying Future of the American Right" The Atlantic (November 18, 2021)

• Donald Trump destroyed the Reagan Republican paradigm in 2016, but he didn’t exactly elucidate a new set of ideas, policies, and alliances. Trump’s devastation of the old order produced a grand struggle on the right to build a new one on Trumpian populist lines.
  The NatCons are wrong to think there is a unified thing called “the left” that hates America. This is just the apocalyptic menace many of them had to invent in order to justify their decision to vote for Donald Trump.
  They are wrong, too, to think there is a wokeist Anschluss taking over all the institutions of American life. For people who spend so much time railing about the evils of social media, they sure seem to spend an awful lot of their lives on Twitter. Ninety percent of their discourse is about the discourse. Anecdotalism was also rampant at the conference—generalizing from three anecdotes about people who got canceled to conclude that all of American life is a woke hellscape. They need to get out more.
  Finally, there is something extremely off-putting about the NatCon public pose. In person, as I say, I find many of them charming, warm, and friendly. But their public posture is dominated by the psychology of threat and menace. If there was one expression of sympathy, kindness, or grace uttered from the podium in Orlando, I did not hear it. But I did hear callousness, invocations of combat, and whiffs of brutality.
  • David Brooks, as quoted in The Terrifying Future of the American Right The Atlantic (November 18, 2021)

• I have been a conservative Republican my entire life. But the Republican Party as a whole has gotten so far out of touch with the American people. I switched my registration so that I could vote for Sanders in the primary, but the day the primary is over I'm going to register as an Independent.
  • Bryan Brown, as quoted by Clare Foran in "The Lifelong Republicans Who Love Bernie Sanders: Some conservatives are defying expectation and backing the Vermont senator" The Atlantic (November 2015)

• What we Republicans should stand for is growth in the economy.
  • George W. Bush, Republican primary debate in Columbia, South Carolina (February 15, 2000)

• Any suggestion that a segregated past was acceptable or positive is offensive and it is wrong. Recent comments by Senator Lott do not reflect the spirit of our country. He has apologized and rightly so. Every day our nation was segregated was a day that America was unfaithful to our founding ideals, and the founding ideals of our nation, and in fact the founding ideals of the political party I represent, was and remains today the equal dignity and equal rights of every American.
  • George W. Bush, regarding comments made by Trent Lott (December 12, 2002), as quoted in "Lott's Remarks on Segregation 'Wrong and Offense'" The Irish Times (December 13, 2002)

C

• [Bob Smith] was almost certainly the last person in Washington to discover that the Republican platform is irrelevant to actual politics. Smith was outraged when he found out. “The Republican platform,” he declared in his party-switching speech to the Senate, “is a meaningless document that has been put out there so that suckers like me and maybe suckers like you out there can read it.” Smith’s speech went on like this for close to an hour. Through all of it, he howled like a man deceived, the lone member of the Senate Sucker Caucus. He even read portions of the platform aloud. It was a mean thing to do—as close to a dirty trick as Smith is probably capable of—but instructive nonetheless. “As a first step in reforming government,” Smith thundered, reciting the painfully hopeful words of some unnamed party scribe, “we support elimination of the Departments of Commerce, Housing and Urban Development, Education, and Energy.” Whatever happened to that promise? he demanded. Or to the promise to defund Legal Services? Not to mention public broadcasting, the UN, and the National Endowment for the Arts. And where’s the legislation that would “make clear that the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections apply to unborn children”? After five and a half years of Republican control of Congress, Smith wanted to know, where is any of it?
  • Tucker Carlson, "Mr. Smith Goes Third Party," Weekly Standard, July 26, 1999

• We, Negro Americans, sing with all loyal Americans. My country 'tis of thee. Sweet land of liberty. Of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died. Land of the Pilgrims' pride. From every mountainside. Let freedom ring. That's exactly what we mean. From every mountain side, let freedom ring. Not only from the Green Mountains and White Mountains of Vermont and New Hampshire; not only from the Catskills of New York; but from the Ozarks in Arkansas, from the Stone Mountain in Georgia, from the great Smoky of Tennessee, and from the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia; not only let it ring for the minorities of the United States, but for the persecuted of Europe, for the rejected of Asia, for the disfranchised of South Africa and for the disinherited of all the earth; may the Republican Party, under God, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.
  • Archibald Carey, speech to the Republican National Convention (1952)

• The party is the party of emancipation, but it has lost its soul. A new constitution and a new state flag offers them an opportunity to regain it.
  • Gil Carmichael, as quoted in "Minor: Both 1890 Constitution and flag should go" (2 July 2015), by Bill Minor, The Clarion-Ledger, Mississippi

• The Republican presidential candidate in 1964 also opposed the Civil Rights Act. Barry Goldwater had been an enthusiastic backer of the 1957 and 1960 civil rights acts, both overwhelmingly opposed by Democrats. He was a founding member of the Arizona chapter of the NAACP. He hired many blacks in his family business and pushed to desegregate the Arizona National Guard. He had a good-faith objection to some features of the 1964 act, which he regarded as unconstitutional. Goldwater was no racist. The same cannot be said of Fulbright, on whom Bill Clinton bestowed the Medal of Freedom. Fulbright was one of the 19 senators who signed the “Southern manifesto” defending segregation. Okay, but didn’t all the old segregationist senators leave the Democratic party and become Republicans after 1964? No, just one did: Strom Thurmond. The rest remained in the Democratic party — including former Klansman Robert Byrd, who became president pro tempore of the Senate.
  • Mona Charen, "The Myth of Republican Racism" (26 August 2014), National Review

• Former racists of both parties renounced their old views, as Kevin D. Williamson points out, Lyndon Johnson himself voted against anti-lynching laws and poll-tax repeals, and neither party has a perfect record on racial matters by any stretch. But it is a libel to suggest that the Republican party, the anti-slavery party, the party of Lincoln, and the party that traditionally supported civil rights, anti-lynching laws, and integration, became the racist party after 1964. The 'solid south' Democratic voting pattern began to break down not in the 1960s in response to civil rights but in the 1950s in response to economic development and the Cold War. Black voters in the north, who had been reliable Republicans, began to abandon the GOP in response to the New Deal, encouraged by activists like Robert Vann to 'turn Lincoln's picture to the wall. That debt has been paid in full'. In the 1940s, the GOP garnered only about 25 percent of southern votes. The big break came with Eisenhower's victories. Significant percentages of white southerners voted for Ike even though the Democratic party remained firmly segregationist and even though Eisenhower backed two civil-rights bills and enforced the Brown decision by federalizing the National Guard. They also began to send GOP representatives to the House. These Republican gains came not from the most rural and 'deep south' regions, but rather from the newer cities and suburbs. If the new southern Republican voters were white racists, one would have expected Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia to be the first to turn.
  • Mona Charen, "The Myth of Republican Racism" (26 August 2014), National Review.

• The League of Nations had no sooner been created than it received an almost mortal blow. The United States abandoned President Wilson’s offspring. The President himself, ready to do battle for his ideals, suffered a paralytic stroke just as he was setting forth on his campaign, and lingered henceforward a futile wreck for a great part of two long and vital years, at the end of which his party and his policy were swept away by the Republican Presidential victory of 1920. Across the Atlantic on the morrow of the Republican success isolationist conceptions prevailed. Europe must be left to stew in its own juice, and must pay its lawful debts. At the same time tariffs were raised to prevent the entry of the goods by which alone these debts could be discharged. At the Washington Conference of 1921, far-reaching proposals for naval disarmament were made by the United States, and the British and American Governments proceeded to sink their battleships and break up their military establishments with gusto. It was argued in odd logic that it would be immoral to disarm the vanquished unless the victors also stripped themselves of their weapons. The finger of Anglo-American reprobation was presently to be pointed at France, deprived alike of the Rhine frontier and of her treaty guarantee, for maintaining, even on a greatly reduced scale, a French Army based upon universal service.
  • Winston Churchill, The Second World War Volume I: The Gathering Storm (1948), ISBN 0-395-41055-X, pp. 12

• I cannot control what the Republicans leak and what they are contending.
  • Hillary Clinton, Meet the Press (January 2016).

• During the war 500,000 colored men and boys were called up under the draft, not one of whom sought to evade it. They took their places wherever assigned in defense of the nation of which they are just as truly citizens as are any others. The suggestion of denying any measure of their full political rights to such a great group of our population as the colored people is one which, however it might be received in some other quarters, could not possibly be permitted by one who feels a responsibility for living up to the traditions and maintaining the principles of the Republican Party. Our Constitution guarantees equal rights to all our citizens, without discrimination on account of race or color. I have taken my oath to support that Constitution. It is the source of your rights and my rights. I propose to regard it, and administer it, as the source of the rights of all the people, whatever their belief or race.
  • Calvin Coolidge, letter to Charles F. Gardner (9 August 1924).

• Clenching his square jaw, Rockefeller had hit the stage with an immediate task: to speak in favor of a proposed amendment to the Republican Party platform denouncing extremism, specifically that of the Communist Party, the Ku Klux Klan, and the ultraconservative, red-baiting John Birch Society. The platform committee, controlled by Goldwater loyalists, had rejected this resolution. Yet the moderates hadn’t given up. On the opening night of the convention, Gov. Mark Hatfield of Oregon had declared, “There are bigots in this nation who spew forth their venom of hate. They parade under hundreds of labels, including the Communist Party, the Ku Klux Klan, and the John Birch Society. They must be overcome.”
  That was not the predominant sentiment within the Cow Palace. Hatfield was met with a barrage of hisses and boos. He later called the response “frightening” and reflected, “It spoke to me not merely of strong political disagreement, but of a spiteful kind of enmity waiting to be unleashed to destroy any-one seen as the enemy — domestic or foreign.”
  The delegates were strident anticommunists — many feared evil reds were subverting the government and the nation’s most revered institutions — and for them, Goldwater was the leader of a do-or-die crusade against leftism. They would eagerly back a resolution reviling commies. And though the Grand Old Party — founded a century earlier by antislavery politicians — was now actively moving to court racist Southern voters opposed to desegregation and civil rights, they might disavow the Klan. But including the John Birch Society in this lineup of extremists to be deplored was a not-subtle-at-all dig at Goldwater and his fanatic followers. Everyone in the room knew what — and who — this resolution was aimed at.
  • David Corn, “The GOP's American psychosis didn't start with Trump. It won't end with him, either.”, NBC News, (Sept. 18, 2022); adapted from "American Psychosis: A Historical Investigation of How the Republican Party Went Crazy,” by David Corn

• As soon as Rockefeller proposed adding the anti-Bircher amendment to the platform, the crowd shouted, “No! No!” A rumbling of boos resounded through the hall. Rockefeller pushed on: “It is essential that this convention repudiate here and now any doctrine —” Another cascade of jeers interrupted him. He smiled and waited for it to subside. At least he was now showing the world the true nature of this new Goldwater-bewitched GOP. In Goldwater’s command center, top campaign aides dispatched a message to their delegates: Knock it off.
  A defiant Rockefeller continued, assailing “any doctrinaire militant minority, whether Communist, Ku Klux Klan, or Bircher.” The booing got louder. Rockefeller noted that Eisenhower, addressing the convention two hours earlier, had called on the GOP to reject radicalism of the left and right. He quoted himself — from a speech he had given a year before — warning that the Republican Party “is in real danger of subversion by a radical, well-financed, highly disciplined” minority that was “wholly alien to the sound and honest conservatism.” More boos. He was clearly referring to the Birchers, and he urged his fellow Republicans to heed “this extremist threat” and “its danger to the party.”
  As veteran political correspondent Theodore White, who was present, later put it, Rockefeller “was the man who called them kooks, and now, like kooks, they responded to prove his point,” and the “kooks” were “hating and screaming and reveling in their own frenzy.” A call for reasonableness, a plea to spurn the paranoid, irrational, and conspiratorial tenets of the far right — this was not what Goldwater’s people wanted to hear. Some reporters feared Goldwater supporters were about to storm the stage and physically attack the governor.
  Maintaining a wry and cocky smile, Rockefeller told the audience, “This is still a free country, ladies and gentlemen,” and he condemned the “infiltration and takeover of established political parties by Communist and Nazi methods.” He added, “Some of you don’t like to hear it ... but it’s the truth.” He declared, “The Republican Party must repudiate these people."
  • David Corn, “The GOP's American psychosis didn't start with Trump. It won't end with him, either.”, NBC News, (Sept. 18, 2022); adapted from "American Psychosis: A Historical Investigation of How the Republican Party Went Crazy,” by David Corn

• Republicans are very good at propaganda; but there are limits to such strategies.
  • Ryan Cooper, "Why Republicans should be praying that the Supreme Court upholds ObamaCare" (17 June 2015), The Week.

• The Republicans had fielded an army and navy of more than 2.5 million men, had invented national banking, currency, and taxation, had provided schools and homes for poor Americans, and had freed the country's four million slaves... Republicans have taken the stand that economic opportunity is central to the American ideal and that it is the government's responsibility to make it possible for everyone to rise.
  • Heather Cox Richardson, To Make Men Free: A History of the Republican Party (2014), p. ix.

• The history of the Republican Party is marked by vacillation between its founding principle of opportunity and its domination by the wealthy elite. The party came together in the 1850s in opposition to the wealthy slaveholders who controlled the federal government. Democrats acting on their behalf insisted that America’s primary principle was the Constitution's protection of property, and they pushed legislation to let planters monopolize the country’s resources at the expense of the working... Abraham Lincoln and others recoiled from the idea of government as a prop for the rich. In organizing the Republican Party, they highlighted the equality of opportunity promised in the Declaration of Independence and warned that a healthy economy depended on widespread prosperity. Northerners and hardscrabble Westerners flocked to that vision, and elected Lincoln to the White House in 1860.
  • Heather Cox Richardson, "Bring Back the Party of Lincoln" (3 September 2014), The New York Times, New York

• The Republican Party is part of a larger American discussion about the tension between equality of opportunity and protection of property, which is sort of the point of the book, that this is a much larger American discussion, and Republicans began under Lincoln with the attempt to turn the discrepancy between the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution into, at the time, a modern-day political solution. The Republican Party would manage, they hoped, to turn the principle of the Declaration of Independence, that everybody should have equality of opportunity, into a political reality. The Declaration of Independence was, of course, a set of principles; it wasn't any kind of law or codification of those principles. The Constitution went ahead and codified that the central idea of America was the protection of property, so the Republicans began with the idea that they would be the political arm of the Declaration of Independence's equality of opportunity. Throughout their history, three times now, they have swung from that pole through a sort of racist and xenophobic backlash against that principle, tied themselves to big business, and come out protecting the other American principle, which is the protection of property. That tension between equality of opportunity and the protection of property, both of which are central tenets of America, played out in the Republican Party.
  • Heather Cox Richardson, as quoted in "'Not the true Republican Party': How the party of Lincoln ended up with Ted Cruz" (29 September 2014), by Elias Isquith, Salon.

• There are parallels between the 1890s and today in voter suppression laws motivated by white conservatives' fears of growing minority strength at the ballot box. In the 1890s, the suppressors were Democrats. Now they are Republicans... African Americans still supported the Republicans, the party of Lincoln and liberty. Slavery, which almost all Democrats supported before the Civil War, was gone. But, the Democrats were still the party of white supremacy... Abraham Lincoln, the country's first Republican president, led the Union to victory in the Civil War and put slavery on the road to extinction. After the war, the GOP was responsible for constitutional amendments that finished off slavery, made African Americans citizens and put the ballot in the hands of black men. It is one of the great tragedies of our time that that party, the party of Lincoln and liberty, is long gone.
  • Berry Craig, "Jim Crow: The Dirty Bird Flies Again" (30 March 2014), LA Progressive.

• I confess I secretly suspect the Republicanism of an orator who is more anxious to show his hearers that he respects what he calls the rights of slavery than that he loves the rights of man. If God be just and the human instinct true, slavery has no rights at all. It has only a legalized toleration. Have I a right to catch a weaker man than I, and appropriate him, his industry, and his family, forever, against his will, to my service? Because if I have, any man stronger than I has the same right over me. But if I have not, what possible right is represented by the two thousand million dollars of property in human beings in this country? It is the right of Captain Kidd on the sea, of Dick Turpin on the land. I certainly do not say that every slave-holder is a bad man, because I know the contrary. The complicity of many with the system is inherited, and often unwilling. But to rob a man of his liberty, to make him so far as possible a brute and a thing, is not less a crime against human nature because it is organized into a hereditary system of frightful proportions. A wrong does not become a right by being vested.
  • George William Curtis, "The Present Aspect of the Slavery Question" (18 October 1859), New York City.

• And as I understand the Republican party, while it steadily holds that slavery is in itself a wrong, it does not forget human conditions and the actual state of things, and, therefore, that the questions of planting slavery in fresh territory and of removing it where it is in wrought in a system of society are very different, as different as the prevention and the cure of disease. The question of the moment, then, is simply whether the most unrelenting and permanent despotism can be justified by the Constitution of the United States. That is, whether the makers of the government meant that the democratic-republican principle should gradually, but surely, disappear from that government. There are, therefore, but two parties, one holding that a system of free society, the other that one of slave society, is the real intention of the government. These parties are sectionally divided in situation, but they both aim to have their idea become the national policy. The party of slavery, indeed, is divided in its own camp, but only upon a minor question.
  • George William Curtis, "The Present Aspect of the Slavery Question" (18 October 1859), New York City.

• We believe the strength of our nation lies with the individual and that each person's dignity, freedom, ability and responsibility must be honored... We believe in equal rights, equal justice and equal opportunity for all, regardless or race, creed, sex, age or disability... We believe free enterprise and encouraging individual initiative have brought this nation opportunity, economic growth and prosperity... We believe government must practice fiscal responsibility and allow individuals to keep more of the money they earn... We believe the proper role of government is to provide for the people only those critical functions that cannot be performed by individuals or private organizations and that the best government is that which governs least... We believe the most effective, responsible and responsive government is government closest to the people... We believe Americans must retain the principles that have made us strong while developing new and innovative ideas to meet the challenges of changing times... We believe Americans value and should preserve our national strength and pride while working to extend peace, freedom and human rights throughout the world.
  • Cuyahoga Valley Republicans, About the Cuyahoga Valley Republicans.

• The Republican Party was born in the early 1850s by anti-slavery activists and individuals who believed that government should grant western lands to settlers free of charge. The first informal meeting of the party took place in Ripon, Wisconsin, a small town northwest of Milwaukee. The first official Republican meeting took place on July 6, 1854 in Jackson, Michigan. The name 'Republican' was chosen because it alluded to equality and reminded individuals of Thomas Jefferson's Democratic-Republican Party. At the Jackson convention, the new party adopted a platform and nominated candidates for office in Michigan. In 1856, the Republicans became a national party when John C. Fremont was nominated for President under the slogan, 'Free soil, free labor, free speech, free men, Fremont'. Even though they were considered a 'third party' because the Democrats and Whigs represented the two-party system at the time, Fremont received 33% of the vote. Four years later, Abraham Lincoln became the first Republican to win the White House. The Civil War erupted in 1861 and lasted four grueling years. During the war, against the advice of his cabinet, Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation that freed the slaves. The Republicans of their day worked to pass the Thirteenth Amendment, which outlawed slavery, the Fourteenth, which guaranteed equal protection under the laws, and the Fifteenth, which helped secure voting rights for African-Americans. The Republican Party also played a leading role in securing women the right to vote.
  • Cuyahoga Valley Republicans, About the Cuyahoga Valley Republicans.

• In 1896, Republicans were the first major party to favor women's suffrage. When the 19th Amendment finally was added to the Constitution, 26 of 36 state legislatures that had voted to ratify it were under Republican control. The first woman elected to Congress was a Republican, Jeanette Rankin from Montana in 1917. Presidents during most of the late nineteenth century and the early part of the twentieth century were Republicans. While the Democrats and Franklin Roosevelt tended to dominate American politics in the 1930s and 40s, for 28 of the forty years from 1952 through 1992, the White House was in Republican hands, under Presidents Eisenhower, Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Bush. Under the last two, Reagan and Bush, the United States became the world's only superpower, winning the Cold War from the old Soviet Union and releasing millions from communist oppression.
  • Cuyahoga Valley Republicans, About the Cuyahoga Valley Republicans.

• Republicans have a long and rich history with basic principles. Individuals, not government, can make the best decisions. All people are entitled to equal rights; and decisions are best made close to home. The symbol of the Republican Party is the elephant. During the mid term elections way back in 1874, Democrats tried to scare voters into thinking President Grant would seek to run for an unprecedented third term. Thomas Nast, a cartoonist for Harper's Weekly, depicted a Democratic jackass trying to scare a Republican elephant, and both symbols stuck... For a long time Republicans have been known as the 'GOP', and party faithfuls thought it meant the 'Grand Old Party'. But apparently the original meaning, in 1875, was 'gallant old party'. And when automobiles were invented it also came to mean, 'get out and push'. That's still a pretty good slogan for Republicans who depend every campaign year on the hard work of hundreds of thousands of volunteers to get out and vote and push people to support the causes of the Republican Party.
  • Cuyahoga Valley Republicans, About the Cuyahoga Valley Republicans.

D

• Most people in business and most people who are successful are Republican. That's just a fact of life.
  • William M. Daley, former White House Chief of Staff to President Obama, quoted in The Chicago Tribune (27 April 2012)

• This... must inevitably raise a few questions—principally, whether or not the GOP remains a gaggle of thieves willing to sell each other’s grandmothers out at a moment’s notice to save their own skin politically, an end-of-times spectacle of an increasingly unstable oligarchy too drunk on its own material excess to save itself from its own decadence and corruption? Another question that springs to mind is whether it’s now in fact degenerated even further into something even more horrible again — a raging collective psychosis of pathological entitlement, collective narcissism, hypernationalist tribalism and jingoism, and death-cult supremacism.
  • Pathological Entitlement and the Supremacist Mindset, Ben Debney, CounterPunch, (March 14, 2021)

• I hate Republicans.
  • Susan J. Douglas, It's Okay To Hate Republicans.

• The Republican Party is the ship and all else is the sea around us.
  • Frederick Douglass, as quoted in Frederick Douglass American Hero (2008), by Connie A. Miller, Sr., p. 277.

• Gentleman, I am a republican, a radical republican, a Black republican, a republican dyed in the wool, and for one I want the republican party to live as long as I do… It is the party of law and order, of liberty and progress, of honor and honesty, as against disloyalty, moral stagnation, dishonest voting, and repudiation.
  • Frederick Douglass, “I Speak to You as an American Citizen” speech, Oct. 1, 1870, Douglas Papers, ser. I, 4:275

• For colored men the Republican party is the deck, all outside is the sea.
  • Frederick Douglass, “The Republican Party Must Be Maintained in Power” speech, April 13, 1872, Douglas Papers, ser. I, 4:298

• I knew that however bad the Republican Party was, the Democratic Party was much worse. The elements of which the Republican Party was composed gave better ground for the ultimate hope of the success of the colored man's cause than those of the Democratic party.
  • Frederick Douglass, Life and Times of Frederick Douglass, chapter 47, p. 579.

• I recognize the Republican Party as the sheet anchor of the colored man's political hopes and the ark of his safety.
  • Frederick Douglass, letter to men from Petersburg, Virginia, August 15, 1888. Douglass papers, Library of Congress. The Petersburg men had written Douglass seeking advice about supporting John M. Langston as their Republican candidate for Congress. He would be their first black representative, but earlier he had worked against the Republican party. Douglass called him a trickster and said not to support anyone "whose mad ambition would imperil the success of the Republican party."

• The Republican Party is not perfect; it is cautious even to the point of timidity; but it is the best friend we have.
  • Frederick Douglass, speech.

• It is not true that the Republican party has not endeavored to protect the negro in his right to vote. The whole moral power of the party has been, from first to last, on the side of justice to the negro; and it has only been baffled, in its efforts to protect the negro in his vote, by the Democratic Party.
  • Frederick Douglass, speech (1888).

• Well, now the American people have returned the Republican Party to power; and the question is, what will it do?
  • Frederick Douglass, speech.

• For a dozen years and more the Republican Party has seemed in a measure paralyzed in the presence of high-handed fraud and brutal violence toward its newly-made citizens. The question now is, will it regain its former health, activity, and power? Will it be as true to its friends in the South as the Democratic Party has been to its friends in that section, or will it sacrifice its friends to conciliate its enemies? ... Not only the negro but all honest men, north and south, must hold the Republican Party in contempt if it fails to do its whole duty at this point. The Republican Party has made the colored man free, and the Republican Party must make him secure in his freedom, or abandon its pretensions.
  • Frederick Douglass, speech.

• If the Republican Party shall fail to carry out this purpose, God will raise up another party that will be faithful.
  • Frederick Douglass, speech.

• There is no race problem before the country, but only a political one, the question whether a Republican has any right to exist south of Mason and Dixon's line... The good Lord had had a chance for a long time before the abolition. I believe that there is a moral government; and that God reigns. I am no pessimist; I give thanks to the good Lord, and also to the good men through whom He has worked. Prominent among them was Garrison, and scarcely less so was Phillips. It was they and their associates who made Abraham Lincoln and the Republican party possible. What abolished slavery was the moral sentiment which had been created, not by the pulpit, but by the Garrisonian platform. The churches did not do much to abolish slavery; but they did much to keep the agitation down.
  • Frederick Douglass, speech at Tremont Temple (September 1890).

• I liked the way you said it, and I’m proud of the fact that yes, we have a chance, we haven’t done it yet, but we should, and people like Donald Trump and ourselves, we need to take over the Republican Party.
  • David Duke, in response to co-host Don Advo's claim that " "We appear to have taken over the Republican Party."David Duke Says ‘People Like Donald Trump and Ourselves’ Should ‘Take Over the Republican Party’, August 27, 2016, at Mediaite

E

• The announcement that the Amendment had been passed by a vote of 119 to 56 was received by the members on the floor and the visitors in the galleries with an outburst of enthusiasm rarely witnessed in the Capitol. Republicans sprang from their seats, and, regardless of parliamentary rules or the Speaker’s efforts to enforce silence, cheered and applauded. The men in the galleries joined in the uproar, while ladies clapped their hands, waved their handkerchiefs, and uttered exclamations of delight and enthusiasm.
  • Anna Morris English, In Memoriam: James Edward English (1891), Michigan: Library of the University of Michigan, p. 23

• In Massachusetts, which is a type of them all, and may justly be considered the model Republican State of the Union, negroes are ... clothed with the privileges and immunities of the white man.
  • William English, The Political Crisis—The Danger and the Remedy, Speech in the House of Representatives 7 (2 May 1860)

• The Republican Party was born in the hothouse of sectional politics in the 1850s. It sprang from several sources that became bound together to fight a common cause, even as they disagreed among themselves on other issues. That cause was checking slavery's advance. That time was a period when many northerners were growing frustrated.
  • Robert F. Engs, The Birth of the Grand Old Party: The Republicans' First Generation (2002), edited by Randall M. Miller, Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania Press, p. 81

F

• Conservatives made history this year. For the first time, an avowed atheist addressed the Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC, the big annual gathering of conservative activists. And atheists occupied an exhibitor’s booth, another first. Jamila Bey, an African American journalist and board member of the group American Atheists, didn’t exactly wow the crowd, for whom professions of religious faith and a belief in God are standard fare. But she wasn’t booed either. For the atheists, long held at arm’s length by Republicans, that’s progress.
  • Linda Feldmann, "Young, conservative, and ... atheist? A test for the GOP" (5 March 2015), The Christian Science Monitor

• Significantly, Floridians could not vote for Republican Abraham Lincoln, who was not on the ballot in any of the Deep South slave states. The hated 'Black Republican' Party was believed by most southerners to advocate abolition and black equality, although Lincoln and his party were primarily interested in restricting the expansion of slavery in the territories.
  • Florida Memory

• The Republican Party is, as it was designed to be, partisan. But, devotion to Republicanism does not imply apostasy from truth.
  • Frank A. Flower, History of the Republican Party: Embracing Its Origin, Growth and Mission (1 July 1884), Grand Rapids, Michigan: Union Book Company, p. iii

• The Republican Party has been the most powerful champion of freedom and equal rights in the world. The feeble and scattered elements that fifty years ago began to combine, here and there, were all lovers of human equality. Under various names, led by a purer patriotism far in advance of the different political organizations to which they had belonged, they continued to grow in numbers and influence, until, composing a majority of their respective communities in this republic, they were, in response to an inexorable law, drawn into one great spirited army, with a common purpose, equal and perpetual freedom for all, and a common name, Republican.
  • Frank A. Flower, History of the Republican Party: Embracing Its Origin, Growth and Mission (1 July 1884), Grand Rapids, Michigan: Union Book Company, p. 1

• It is common for our enemies, and the more superficial members of our own household, to regard the Republican Party as an organization that has little more to do except keep itself in office. The cry that 'the mission of the Republican Party is ended' and that therefore small misfortune, except that it will place the Democrats in power, will result if it shall be dethroned, contains as little truth as the declaration of the church is ended because the Bible is printed.
  • Frank A. Flower, History of the Republican Party: Embracing Its Origin, Growth and Mission (1 July 1884), Grand Rapids, Michigan: Union Book Company, pp. 10–11

• Republicans did develop a policy which recognized the essential humanity of the Negro, and demanded protection for certain basic rights which the Democrats denied him. Although deeply flawed by an acceptance of many racial stereotypes, and limited by the free labor ideology's assumption that the major responsibility for a person's success or failure rested with himself and not society, the Republicans stand on race relations went against the prevailing opinion of the 1850s, and proved a distinct political liability in a racist society.
  • Eric Foner, Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men: The Ideology of the Republican Party before the Civil War, pp. 261–262

• That the United States was a 'white man's government' had been a widely held article of political faith before the Civil War. Reconstruction Republicans rejected this premise.
  • Eric Foner, "The Ideology of the Republican Party", as quoted in The Birth of the Grand Old Party: The Republicans' First Generation] (2002), edited by Robert F. Engs and Randall M. Miller, Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania Press, p. 21

• Lincoln shared many of the prevailing prejudices of his era. But, he insisted, there was a bedrock principle of equality that transcended race. The equal right to the fruits of one's labor. There are many grounds for condemning the institution of slavery. Moral, religious, political, economic. Lincoln referred to all of them at one time or another. But ultimately he saw slavery as a form of theft, of one person appropriating the labor of another. Using a black woman as an illustration, he explained the kind of equality in which he believed, 'In some respects she certainly is not my equal; but in her natural right to eat the bread she earns with her own hands without asking leave of any one else, she is my equal, and the equal of all others'. Shortly before the 1860 election, Frederick Douglass offered a succinct summary of the dilemma confronting opponents of slavery like Lincoln, who worked within the political system rather than outside it. Abstractly, Douglass wrote, most northerners would agree that slavery was wrong. The challenge was to find a way of 'translating antislavery sentiment into antislavery action'. The constitution barred interference with slavery in the states where it already existed. For Lincoln, as for most Republicans, antislavery action meant not attacking slavery where it was but working to prevent slavery's westward expansion. Lincoln, however, did talk about a future without slavery. The aim of the Republican Party, he insisted, was to put the institution on the road to 'ultimate extinction‍'‍, a phrase he borrowed from Henry Clay. Ultimate extinction could take a long time. Lincoln once said that slavery might survive for another hundred years. But to the south, Lincoln seemed as dangerous as an abolitionist, because he was committed to the eventual end of slavery. This was why his election in 1860 led inexorably to secession and civil war.
  • Eric Foner, "Our Lincoln" (26 January 2009), The Nation

• Congress incorporated birthright citizenship and legal equality into the Constitution via the Fourteenth Amendment. In recent decades, the courts have used this amendment to expand the legal rights of numerous groups, most recently, gay men and women. As the Republican editor George William Curtis wrote, the Fourteenth Amendment changed a Constitution 'for white men' to one 'for mankind'. It also marked a significant change in the federal balance of power, empowering the national government to protect the rights of citizens against violations by the states. In 1867 Congress passed the Reconstruction Acts, again over Johnson’s veto. These set in motion the establishment of new governments in the South, empowered Southern black men to vote and temporarily barred several thousand leading Confederates from the ballot. Soon after, the 15th Amendment extended black male suffrage to the entire nation. The Reconstruction Acts inaugurated the period of Radical Reconstruction, when a politically mobilized black community, with its white allies, brought the Republican Party to power throughout the South. For the first time, African-Americans voted in large numbers and held public office at every level of government. It was a remarkable, unprecedented effort to build an interracial democracy on the ashes of slavery. Most offices remained in the hands of white Republicans. But the advent of African-Americans in positions of political power aroused bitter hostility from Reconstruction's opponents.
  • Eric Foner, "Why Reconstruction Matters" (28 March 2015), The New York Times, New York

• The Fourteenth Amendment was for many decades considered a crowning achievement of what once called itself the party of Lincoln.
  • Eric Foner, "What is an American?: Birthright citizenship, more than anything else, makes our country exceptional" (6 September 2015), Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

• I would suggest that the Republican Party get to work demanding an apology by the Democratic Party to the descendants of the slaves and to all the descendants of all those Republican congressmen who voted for the slew of anti-lynching laws blocked by Democratic senatorial filibusters.
  • John Frary, "Let’s have some Democratic apologies for party’s support of slavery, Confederacy" (29 June 2015), Central Maine

• I have this calm belief that that 40 percent of the Republican Party wants their party back
  • Democrat Adam Frisch Lauren Boebert’s extremely tight race in a safe Republican district, explained ("By Li Zhouli@vox.com Updated Nov 9, 2022, 6:30pm EST")

G

• The Democratic Party said to the Republicans, ‍'‍If you elect the man of your choice as President of the United States we will shoot your government to death‍'‍; but the people of this country, refusing to be coerced by threats or violence, voted as they pleased, and lawfully elected Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States.
  • James A. Garfield, speech (29 March 1879)

• Human slavery... The Democratic Party taught that it was divine; God's institution. They defended it, they stood around it, they followed it to its grave as a mourner. But here it lies, dead by the hand of Abraham Lincoln; dead by the power of the Republican Party, dead by the justice of Almighty God... Is there any death here in our camp? Yes, yes! Three hundred and fifty thousand soldiers, the noblest band that ever trod the earth, died to make this camp a camp of glory and of liberty forever. But there are no dead issues here. There are no dead ideas here. Hang out our banner from under the blue sky this night, until it shall sweep the green turf under your feet. It hangs over our camp. Read away up under the stars the inscription we have written on it, lo these twenty-five years... Twenty-five years ago the Republican Party was married to liberty, and this is our silver wedding, fellow-citizens... Come down the glorious steps of our banner. Every great record we have made we have vindicated with our blood and with our truth. It sweeps the ground, and it touches the stars. Come here, young man, and put in your young life where all is living, and where nothing is dead but the heroes that defended it.
  • James A. Garfield, "Don't Pitch Your Tent Among the Dead" (October 1879)

• The United States is on pace to spend over $7 trillion over the next ten years for the Pentagon. To put that number in perspective, the U.S. spends more each year on the military than China, Russia, India, the U.K., Germany, France, Japan, South Korea and Australia combined. While Republicans and Democrats are in sharp disagreements over the much smaller Build Back Better legislation, there is largely a bipartisan consensus when it comes to the military budget and foreign military intervention...
  • Amy Goodman, “The War Party”: Jeremy Scahill on How U.S. Militarism Unifies Democrats & Republicans, Democracy Now! (24 November 2021)

• I wouldn't confuse the conservative movement and the Republican Party, 'cause they're two different things. The Republican Party is sometimes a vehicle for the conservative movement.
  • Joe Gaylord a Republican political consultant, as quoted by "What's Behind the 'Mad as Hell' Movement?" by Jeff Greenfield in CBS News (20 September 2009)

• The party of Lincoln, called the Republican party, under its present name and organization is of recent origin. It is admitted to be an anti-slavery party, while it attracts to itself by its creed, the scattered advocates of exploded political heresies, of condemned theories in political economy, the advocates of commercial restrictions, of protection, of special privileges, of waste and corruption in the administration of Government; anti-slavery is its mission and its purpose.
  • Georgia Declaration of Causes of Secession (January 1861)

• The problem comes in viewing Goldwater as an example rather than as a warning. Conservatives sometimes describe his defeat as a necessary, preliminary step — a clarifying and purifying struggle — in the Reagan revolution. In fact, it was an electoral catastrophe that awarded Lyndon Johnson a powerful legislative majority, increased the liberal ambitions of the Great Society and caused massive distrust of the GOP among poor and ethnic voters. The party has never quite recovered. Ronald Reagan was, in part, elected president by undoing Goldwater’s impression of radicalism. And all of Reagan’s domestic achievements involved cleaning up just a small portion of the excesses that Goldwater's epic loss enabled. The Republican Party needs internal debate and populist energy. But it is not helped by nostalgia for a disaster.
  • Michael Gerson, "Michael Gerson: Barry Goldwater’s warning to the GOP" (17 April 2014), The Washington Post

• Here is the problem in sum. Republicans have not been given the option of choosing the lesser of two evils. The GOP has selected someone who is unfit to be president, lacking the temperament, stability, judgment and compassion to occupy the office. This is a terrible error, which has probably cost conservatives a majority on the Supreme Court. But the mistake was made by Republican primary voters in choosing.
  • Michael Gerson, "The most depressing moment of the 2016 race" (30 May 2016), The Washington Post, Washington, D.C.

• [M]any of us will never be able to think about the Republican Party in quite the same way again. It still carries many of the ideological convictions I share. Collectively, however, it has failed one of the most basic tests of public justice... Don't support racists — or candidates who appeal to racism — for public office. If this commitment is not a primary, non-negotiable element of Republican identity, then the party of Lincoln is dead.
  • Michael Gerson, "The party of Lincoln is dying" (9 June 2016), The Washington Post, Washington, D.C.

• [T]he nation has need of Republican vertebrates.
  • Michael Gerson, "Republicans, it’s time to panic" (12 October 2017), The Washington Post, Washington, D.C.

• I'm not a libertarian. If you are, you're welcome to vote for me and help this party, but we're not gonna build the party around libertarian ideas.
  • Lindsey O. Graham, as quoted in South Carolina GOP convention (16 May 2009) as quoted in "Lindsey Graham gets combative over GOP's future" (2009), Political Thinker, Cable News Network

• In 2008, over half of Republicans reported attending church at least once a month, according to data Mr. Burge compiled from the Cooperative Election Study at Harvard University. In 2022, over half reported attending church once a year or less.
  •  Ruth Graham and Charles Homans; “Trump Is Connecting With a Different Type of Evangelical Voter”, New York Times, (Jan 8, 2024).

• Under existing conditions the negro votes the Republican ticket because he knows his friends are of that party. Many a good citizen votes the opposite, not because he agrees with the great principles of state which separate parties, but because, generally, he is opposed to negro rule. This is a most delusive cry. Treat the negro as a citizen and a voter, as he is and must remain, and soon parties will be divided, not on the color line, but on principle. Then we shall have no complaint of sectional interference.
  • Ulysses S. Grant, Sixth State of the Union Address (7 December 1874)

• I am a Republican, as the two great political parties as now divided, because the Republican party is a National party, seeking the greatest good for the greatest number of citizens. There is not a precinct in this vast Nation where a Democrat cannot cast his ballot and have it counted as cast. No matter what the prominence of the opposite party, he can proclaim his political opinions, even if he is only one among a thousand, without fear and without proscription on account of his opinions.
  • Ulysses S. Grant, as quoted in Words of Our Hero, Ulysses S. Grant, p. 57

• I am a Republican for many other reasons. The Republican party assures protection to life and property, the public credit and the payment of the debts of the Government, State, county, or municipality so far as it can control. The Democratic party does not promise this; if it does, it has broken its promises to the extent of hundreds of millions, as many Northern Democrats can testify to their sorrow.
  • Ulysses S. Grant, as quoted in Words of Our Hero, Ulysses S. Grant, p. 58

• The Republican party is a party of progress and of liberality toward its opponents. It encourages the poor to strive to better their children, to enable them to compete successfully with their more fortunate associates, and, in fine, it secures an entire equality before the law of every citizen, no matter what his race, nationality, or previous condition. It tolerates no privileged class. Every one has the opportunity to make himself all he is capable of.
  • Ulysses S. Grant, as quoted in Words of Our Hero, Ulysses S. Grant, by Jeremiah Chaplin, p. 59

• Now, the Democrats have a different plan. The Democrats say that, 'If you have health insurance, we're going to make it better. If you don't have health insurance, we going to provide it to you. If you can’t afford health insurance, then we'll help you afford health insurance'. So America gets to decide. Do you want the Democratic plan, or do you want the Republican plan? Remember, the Republican plan. 'Don't get sick. And if you do get sick, die quickly'.
  • Alan Grayson, regarding U.S. health care reform (2009)

• America understands that there is one party in this country that is favor of health care reform and one party that is against it, and they know why. They understand that if Barack Obama were somehow able to cure hunger in the world the Republicans would blame him for overpopulation. They understand that if Barack Obama could somehow bring about world peace they would blame him for destroying the defense industry. In fact, they understand that if Barack Obama has a BLT sandwich tommorrow for lunch, they will try to ban bacon. But that's not what America wants, America wants solutions to its problems and that begins with health care, and that's what I'm speaking for tonight.
  • Alan Grayson, regarding U.S. health care reform (2009)

• Fox News and their Republican collaborators are the enemy of America. The enemy of anybody who wants anything good for this country.
  • Alan Grayson, as quoted in "Grayson: GOP, FOX News 'Enemy Of America'" (21 October 2009), RealClearPolitics.

• I think Bill Clinton was the best Republican president we've had in a while.
  • Alan Greenspan, as quoted in Meet The Press (23 September 2007)

• The GOP today is a tale of two parties. One of them, the gubernatorial wing, is growing and successful. The other, the federal wing, is increasingly marginalizing itself, and unless changes are made, it will be increasingly difficult for Republicans to win another presidential election in the near future. Republicans have lost the popular vote in five of the last six presidential elections. States in which our presidential candidates used to win, such as New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada, Iowa, Ohio, New Hampshire, Virginia, and Florida, are increasingly voting Democratic. We are losing in too many places... Republican governors are America’s reformers in chief. They continue to deliver on conservative promises of reducing the size of government while making people’s lives better. They routinely win a much larger share of the minority vote than GOP presidential candidates, demonstrating an appeal that goes beyond the base of the Party.
  • Growth & Opportunity Project (2013), Republican National Committee

• Our Party knows how to appeal to older voters, but we have lost our way with younger ones. We sound increasingly out of touch... The Republican Party needs to stop talking to itself. We have become expert in how to provide ideological reinforcement to like-minded people, but devastatingly we have lost the ability to be persuasive with, or welcoming to, those who do not agree with us on every issue. Instead of driving around in circles on an ideological cul-de-sac, we need a Party whose brand of conservatism invites and inspires new people to visit us. We need to remain America’s conservative alternative to big-government, redistribution-to-extremes liberalism, while building a route into our Party that a non-traditional Republican will want to travel. Our standard should not be universal purity; it should be a more welcoming conservatism... The perception, revealed in polling, that the GOP does not care about people is doing great harm to the Party and its candidates on the federal level, especially in presidential years. It is a major deficiency that must be addressed... Democrats tend to talk about people, Republicans tend to talk about policy.
  • Growth & Opportunity Project (2013), Republican National Committee

• If we are going to grow as a Party, our policies and actions must take into account that the middle class has struggled mightily and that far too many of our citizens live in poverty. To people who are flat on their back, unemployed or disabled and in need of help, they do not care if the help comes from the private sector or the government — they just want help. Our job as Republicans is to champion private growth so people will not turn to the government in the first place. But we must make sure that the government works for those truly in need, helping them so they can quickly get back on their feet. We should be driven by reform, eliminating, and fixing what is broken, while making sure the government’s safety net is a trampoline, not a trap... Our policies must lead people to a better life through a thriving, growing private sector that works for the middle class, and those in need.
  • Growth & Opportunity Project (2013), Republican National Committee

• It is time for Republicans on the federal level to learn from successful Republicans on the state level. It is time to smartly change course, modernize the Party, and learn once again how to appeal to more people, including those who share some but not all of our conservative principles. If our Party is not welcoming and inclusive, young people and increasingly other voters will continue to tune us out. The Party should be proud of its conservative principles, but just because someone disagrees with us on 20 percent of the issues, that does not mean we cannot come together on the rest of the issues where we do agree... The African American community has a lot in common with the Republican Party, and it is important to share this rich history. More importantly, the Republican Party must be committed to building a lasting relationship within the African American community year-round, based on mutual respect and with a spirit of caring... We must be a party that is welcoming and inclusive for all voters.
  • Growth & Opportunity Project (2013), Republican National Committee

• [B]y what inattention these scurrilously racist Republicans installed the first African-American secretary of state and national security advisor, appointed a black Supreme Court justice, elected the first black U.S. senator since Reconstruction, and sent the troops into Little Rock.
  • Allen C. Guelzo, letter (May 2010)

H

• We need to acknowledge he [Trump] let us down. He went down a path he shouldn’t have, and we shouldn’t have followed him, and we shouldn’t have listened to him. And we can’t let that ever happen again.
  • Nikki Haley, in Nikki Haley’s Time for Choosing February 12, 2021

• The first act of the black republican party will be to exclude slavery from all the territories, from the District of Columbia, the arsenals and the forts, by the action of the general government. That would be a recognition that slavery is a sin, and confine the institution to its present limits. The moment that slavery is pronounced a moral evil, a sin, by the general government, that moment the safety of the rights of the south will be entirely gone.
  • Alexander Hamilton Handy, as quoted in "Why Non-Slaveholding Southeners Fought: Address to the Charleston Library Society" (January 2011), by Gordon Rhea, Civil War Trust.

• I do not want Americans of foreign birth making their party alignments on what we mean to do for some nation in the old world. We want them to be Republican because of what we mean to do for the United States of America. Our call is for unison, not rivaling sympathies. Our need is concord, not the antipathies of long inheritance.
  • Warren G. Harding, Nationalism and Americanism (1920).

• However strange it seems, the Republican Party really is spinning off into a bizarro-cult who believe Barack Obama is a baby-killer plotting to build death panels for the grannies of America.
  • Johann Hari, as quoted in "The Republican Party Is Turning Into A Cult", The Huffington Post (18 August 2009).

• • Donald Trump and the Republican Party, along with media outlets such as FOX News, in a bid to retain power, are fanning the flames of violence, seeing in the incitement of far-right mobs a route to a ruthless police state.
  • Chris Hedges "American Bloodlands" (September 8, 2020)

• The power brokers in the radical Christian Right have already moved from the fringes of society to the executive branch, the House of Representatives, the Senate and the courts. The movement has seized control of the Republican Party.
  • Chris Hedges American fascists : the Christian Right and the war on America (2007), p22

• The Republican primary battles in California in 1962 foreshadowed the Goldwater presidential nomination of 1964, just as Goldwater's campaign led to Reagan's rise to power, first in California and then in national politics. Three Republican congressional nominees in 1962 publicly identified themselves as members of the Birch Society. All three went down to defeat in the fall election, as did Richard Nixon in his race for the governor's seat against the incumbent Democrat Pat Brown (which prompted Nixon's famous promise to the press, later reneged on, that "You won't have Dick Nixon to kick around any more"). On the surface, liberals had much to cheer about in those results, but in fact they marked an ominous new development. From here on, in order to win a Republican primary in California, a candidate would have to satisfy the ideological demands of the far Right.
  • Dorothy Ray Healey California Red: A Life in the American Communist Party (1990)

• Why would the Republican Party insult its members with such a disingenuous offering of the Republican Party’s ideals? If the Republican Party really believes that individual rights are the foundation of a free society and that the Republican Party considers discrimination based on sex, race, age, religion, creed, disability, or national origin to be immoral, why does the Republican Party make it a point in their platform to call for a constitutional amendment prohibiting same sex marriage? If the Republican Party believes in the devotion to the inherent dignity and rights of every person, why is it that the Republican Party wants to take away the right for a woman under any circumstances from having an abortion? If the Republican Party believes in freedom of speech and freedom of the press and opposes all attempts to violate or weaken those rights, why is it that the Republican Party wants to take away those same freedoms by passing legislation making it a crime to desecrate the American flag?
  • Joe Heuer, "Mission Statement" (31 January 2015), Reforming the Republican Party.

• I am a Republican. However, the Republican Party has lost its way. Those who either believe in or are afraid to take a stance against exorbitant government spending as a way to solve our nations problems have hijacked the Republican Party. The Republican Party is now controlled by the religious right who refuse to support a Republican candidate who believes that it is not the place of the government to interfere with its citizen’s personal choices... For the Republican Party to rise to power again, it must remember its fiscally conservative roots while embracing a more socially liberal platform. Why? Because I believe that the majority of the people in this country are close enough to the center to embrace this new platform. It is clearly evident that the Republican Party has not only disenfranchised many members of its own party, but has also lost touch with independents and moderate liberals as well. In my opinion, the reality is that most people in the United States are fiscally conservative. They want a fair tax policy. They believe in limited government. They want a balanced budget. They believe in deregulation. However, in my opinion, the other reality is that most people in the United States consider themselves to be more socially liberal. While many people feel that having an abortion or same sex marriage is immoral, those same people believe that the government should not pass 'moral legislation' and take away those choices for each individual to make. How does restricting an individual’s rights unify our country? Therefore, the purpose of this blog is to have an open discussion about how the Republican Party can win back voters at a national level. Demographics have helped win back Congress, but more is needed to win in 2016. Republicans cannot be afraid to take on the establishment. Big money cannot control who can and cannot successful run for office. Republicans cannot be beholden the far right.
  • Joe Heuer, "Mission Statement" (31 January 2015), Reforming the Republican Party

• Guttural rejection of reason, evidence and science trickles into just about every aspect of Republican ideology.
  • Katrina vanden Heuvel, "The Republicans' war on science and reason" (25 October 2011), The Washington Post, Washington, D.C.

• From 1854, when the Republican Party was founded, Democrats labeled it adherents 'black' Republicans to identify them as proponents of black equality. During the 1860 elections Southern Democrats used the term derisively to press their belief that Abraham Lincoln's victory would incite slave rebellions.
  • Historical Times Encyclopedia of the Civil War

• There are some issues that transcend politics. While my position is certainly political, I am an American first. There should never be a day in the United States of America when people are excluded based solely on their race or religion. It is un-Republican. It is unconstitutional. And it is un-American.
  • Jennifer Horn, as quoted in "Dick Cheney, more conservatives slam Trump's proposal to keep Muslims out of U.S." (7 December 2015), by Stephanie Condon, CBS News, CBS

• Traditional Republican themes, including marketplace incentives, private initiatives, decentralized power, streamlined government and broadly-based international engagement. Over time, most of Ripon's early agenda, revenue sharing, welfare reform, a volunteer army, minority business enterprise, school desegregation, government reorganization, affirmative action, a new opening to China and other initiatives, was reflected in the policies... Civil rights was a matter on which the party of Lincoln should exercise particularly strong leadership. It was a part of the party's DNA.
  • Lee Huebner, "The Roots of Ripon Republicanism" (May 2015), The Ripon Forum

• Republicans must be more mindful about our perception. Yes, we need to fight for our principles. Yes, we must be brave enough to deliver unpopular news. Yes, we must stand.
  • Joseph Hunter, "Opposing Political Correctness" (10 August 2015), Hip Hop Republican

I

• With proper safeguards to the purity of the ballot box, the elective franchise should be based upon loyalty to the Constitution and the Union recognizing and affirming the equality of all men before the law. Therefore we are in favor of amending the Constitution of our State by striking out the word WHITE in the article on Suffrage.
  • Iowa Republican Party Platform (1865), as quoted in History of Iowa from the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century (1903), by Benjamin F. Gue, Volume III, Chapter 1

J

• Kemp declared that the Republican Party is the party of Lincoln. But just what is the connection between the Republican Party of 1860 and that of 1996? The essence of slavery, Lincoln said, was expressed in the proposition: "You work; I'll eat." Upon his election as president, he was besieged by office seekers who drove him to distraction. Lincoln was blunt in his judgment of the great majority of them. They wanted to eat without working. Lincoln saw the demand for the protection of slavery and the demand for government sinecures to be at bottom one and the same. The origin of all constitutional rights, according to Lincoln, was the right that a man had to own himself, and therefore to own the product of his own labor. Government exists to protect that right, and to regulate property only to make it more valuable to its possessors.
  • Harry V. Jaffa, "The Party of Lincoln vs. The Party of Bureaucrats" (13 September 1996), Writings, The Claremont Institute

• People no longer trust the career politicians, no longer trust the status-quo because they screwed it up so bad. I loved listening to you talk to those other talking heads about 'Donald Trump could be the destruction of the whole Republican Party.' I throw my hands up in the air and cheer. I hope it happens!
  • James Janos, on CNN with Don Lemon (2015), as quoted in "Jesse Ventura Wants to Destroy the Political Establishment and He's Named Two Guys to Do It" (7 October 2015), by Chris Enloe, IJ Review

• I have gotten more flak for being a conservative Republican than I have for being trans.
  • Caitlyn Jenner, speech at the University of Pennsylvania (February 2016).

• I want to be among those in the party who are willing to live up to Republican principles.
  • David Johnson, as quoted in "Iowa state senator is first elected official to leave Republican party over Trump" (7 June 2016), by Ben Jacobs, The Guardian, United Kingdom

• I will not stand silent if the party of Lincoln and the end of slavery buckles under the racial bias of a bigot.
  • David Johnson, as quoted in "Iowa GOP lawmaker dumps party to protest Trump" (7 June 2016), by William Petroski, The Des Moines Register, Iowa

• There is no southern problem; there is no northern problem. There is only an American problem, and we are met here tonight as Americans. Not as Democrats or Republicans; we are met here as Americans to solve that problem.
  • Lyndon B. Johnson, as quoted in The American Promise (15 March 1965), Washington, D.C.

• It's not easy to be a young, black Republican. Friends and family often give them the side eye, and some people who don't know them at all consider them to be 'traitors'. They also don't have the same access to a tightly interwoven network of professional contacts and connections as their counterparts in the Democratic Party, which the vast majority of African-American elected officials is affiliated. So, what's the attraction? For many it's a combination of history and good old-fashioned conservative values. The GOP, they argue, is the party that emancipated blacks from slavery, gave them the right to vote and provided other opportunities toward independence.
  • Joyce Jones, as quoted in "The Loneliness of the Black Republican: What attracts young African-Americans to the GOP?" 10 December 2013), by J. Jones, BET, Black Entertainment Television.

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I knew this much — that everybody voted Democrat down my way. If you were poor, you voted Democrat and if you were rich you voted Republican. ~ Jack Kirby

• The anti-slavery party contend that slavery is wrong in itself, and the Government is a consolidated national democracy. We of the South contend that slavery is right, and that this is a confederate Republic of sovereign States.
  • Laurence Massillon Keitt, as quoted in "Congressman from South Carolina, in a speech to the House" (25 January 1860), The Congressional Globe.

• Ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which was intended to guarantee that federal voting rights could not be denied on the basis of race. The Fifteenth Amendment had been passed by Congress in February 1869 and was being debated in state legislatures when the featured cartoon was published. The Republican-controlled New York legislature ratified the measure, but the fall 1869 elections returned a Democratic majority, which soon reversed the earlier vote. However, the amendment did gain the approval of enough state legislatures to become part of the Constitution in March 1870.
  • Robert C. Kennedy, "Uncle Sam's Thanksgiving Dinner" (2001), HarpWeek

• I knew this much — that everybody voted Democrat down my way. If you were poor, you voted Democrat and if you were rich you voted Republican.
  • Jack Kirby, February 1990, posted May 23, 2011 in issue 134 of The Comics Journal, now on TCJ Archive, page 5

• Drilling without thinking has of course been Republican Party policy since May 2008. When gas prices soared to unprecedented heights, the conservative leader Newt Gingrich unveiled the slogan "Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less," with an emphasis on the now. The wildly popular campaign was a cry against caution, against study, against measured action. In Gingrich's telling, drilling at home wherever the oil and gas might be-locked in Rocky Mountain shale, in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and deep offshore-was a surefire way to lower the price at the pump, create jobs, and kick Arab ass all at once. In the face of this triple win, caring about the environment was for sissies: as Senator Mitch McConnell put it, "in Alabama and Mississippi and Louisiana and Texas, they think oil rigs are pretty."
  • Naomi Klein On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal (2019)

• Ordinary Americans, even those in blue states like California, Washington and Michigan, do not like policies of race-based preferences and discrimination. Republicans ought to recall that equal protection of equal rights is the American ideal, enshrined forever in the proposition that all men are created equal. And it is right. Racism is wrong precisely because equality is right. Republicans should also recall that the principle of equality is at home in the Republican Party. It was the reason the party was founded in 1854 and it was central to the politics of the greatest Republican and greatest civil rights advocate in American history, Abraham Lincoln. Rather than avoid the subject, Republicans should defend colorblind justice and lead the charge to end racial preferences and discrimination. If they do, they might start winning elections the way initiatives for colorblind policies do.
  • Thomas L. Krannawitter, "Winning Strategy For Republicans: Getting Rid Of Racial Preferences" (18 December 2006), Investors, Investor's Business Daily, Inc.

• A fanatical neo-fascist political cult of right-wingers in the GOP, driven by a strange mixture of corrosive hatred and sickening fear that is recklessly determined to control our party or destroy it!
  • Thomas Kuchel, as quoted in Rule and Ruin: The Downfall of Moderation and the Destruction of the Republican Party, From Eisenhower to the Tea Party (2012), by Goeffrey Kabaservice, Studies in Postwar American Political Development, p. 220

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• Negro support for Grant was an expression of hope. The fervent belief that only Grant and his Republican Party, the party of Lincoln, could keep America's promise of equal rights for all men. Lincoln had been the first president to invite Negro participation in the inaugural pageant. Grant was the second. But for Grant, freedom and equal rights were matters of principle, not symbolism. More than even the most progressive-minded white Americans of his time, he rejected prejudice. He knew his soldiers had sacrificed not only to hold the nation together, but also to make men free. He did not want those sacrifices to have been in vain.
  • Charles Lane, The Day Freedom Died: The Colfax Massacre, the Supreme Court, and the Betrayal of Reconstruction (2008), Henry Holt and Company, LLC, New York City, New York, p. 2

• The spirit of the Republican Party does not know white man or black man. All stand equal before it, as they should stand equal before the law.
  • John Langston, speech (16 January 1891), as quoted in A Republican Text-Book For Colored Voters (1901), by Thomas H.R. Clarke and Barney McKay, Washington, D.C.: T.H.R. Clarke and B. McKay

• There's no room in the party of Lincoln for a racist.
  • Chris Lauzen, as quoted in "Candidate's Racist Views Revealed" (27 February 2002), by David R. Kazak, Daily Herald, Illinois

• In 1861, Abraham Lincoln told Congress that the 'leading object' of American government was 'to elevate the condition of men; to lift artificial weights from all shoulders, to clear the paths of laudable pursuit for all, to afford all an unfettered start and a fair chance, in the race of life'. In a single sentence, Lincoln captures the principles of the Republican vision for our country and the essence of what we should strive for when developing and reforming government policy... Republicans are developing to meet the persistent challenges our country faces today.
  • Mike Lee, "The Laudable Pursuit".

• The Republicans inculcate, with whatever of ability they can, that the negro is a man; that his bondage is cruelly wrong, and that the field of his oppression ought not to be enlarged. The Democrats deny his manhood; deny, or dwarf to insignificance, the wrong of his bondage; so far as possible, crush all sympathy for him, and cultivate and excite hatred and disgust against him; compliment themselves as Union-savers for doing so; and call the indefinite outspreading of his bondage "a sacred right of self-government".
  • Abraham Lincoln, speech at Springfield, Illinois (26 June 1857)

• There is another thing to which I wish to ask attention for a little while on this occasion. What has always been the evidence brought forward to prove that the Republican party is a sectional party? The main one was that in the Southern portion of the Union the people did not let the Republicans proclaim their doctrines amongst them. That has been the main evidence brought forward-that they had no supporters, or substantially none, in the slave States. The South have not taken hold of our principles as we announce them... I am altogether unaware that the Republicans are in favor of making any odious distinctions between the Free and Slave States.
  • Abraham Lincoln, Fifth Lincoln–Douglas Debate (7 October 1858), Galesburg, Illinois

• The Republican principle, the unalterable principle, never to be lost sight of, is that slavery is wrong.
  • Abraham Lincoln, speech (1859)

• You say you are conservative — eminently conservative — while we are revolutionary, destructive, or something of the sort. What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried? We stick to, contend for, the identical old policy on the point in controversy which was adopted by "our fathers who framed the Government under which we live;" while you with one accord reject, and scout, and spit upon that old policy, and insist upon substituting something new. True, you disagree among yourselves as to what that substitute shall be. You are divided on new propositions and plans, but you are unanimous in rejecting and denouncing the old policy of the fathers... You charge that we stir up insurrections among your slaves. We deny it, and what is your proof? Harper's Ferry? John Brown? John Brown was no Republican, and you have failed to implicate a single Republican in his Harper's Ferry enterprise. If any member of our party is guilty in that matter, you know it or you do not know it. If you do know it, you are inexcusable for not designating the man and proving the fact. If you do not know it, you are inexcusable for asserting it, and especially for persisting in the assertion after you have tried and failed to make the proof. You need to be told that persisting in a charge which one does not know to be true, is simply malicious slander. Some of you admit that no Republican designedly aided or encouraged the Harper's Ferry affair... But you will not abide the election of a Republican president! In that supposed event, you say, you will destroy the Union, and then, you say, the great crime of having destroyed it will be upon us! That is cool. A highwayman holds a pistol to my ear, and mutters through his teeth, 'Stand and deliver, or I shall kill you, and then you will be a murderer!' To be sure, what the robber demanded of me, my money, was my own, and I had a clear right to keep it, but it was no more my own than my vote is my own, and the threat of death to me, to extort my money, and the threat of destruction to the Union, to extort my vote, can scarcely be distinguished in principle... The Democrats cry John Brown invasion. We are guiltless of it, but our denial does not satisfy them. Nothing will satisfy them but disinfecting the atmosphere entirely of all opposition to slavery. They have not demanded of us to yield the guards of liberty in our state constitutions, but it will naturally come to that after a while. If we give up to them, we cannot refuse even their utmost request. If slavery is right, it ought to be extended; if not, it ought to be restricted, there is no middle ground. Wrong as we think it, we can afford to let it alone where it of necessity now exists; but we cannot afford to extend it into free territory and around our own homes. Let us stand against it!
  • Abraham Lincoln, Cooper Union address (27 February 1860), New York City, New York

• It is exceedingly desirable that all parts of this great confederacy shall be at peace, and in harmony, one with another. Let us Republicans do our part to have it so. Even though much provoked, let us do nothing through passion and ill temper.
  • Abraham Lincoln, Cooper Union address (27 February 1860), New York City, New York

• We think slavery is morally wrong, and a direct violation of that principle. We all think it wrong. It is clearly proved, I think, by natural theology, apart from revelation. Every man, black, white or yellow, has a mouth to be fed and two hands with which to feed it, and that bread should be allowed to go to that mouth without controversy... If the Republicans, who think slavery is wrong, get possession of the general government, we may not root out the evil at once, but may at least prevent its extension. If I find a venomous snake lying on the open praire, I seize the first stick and kill him at once. But if that snake is in bed with my children, I must be more cautious. I shall, in striking the snake, also strike the children, or arouse the reptile to bite the children. Slavery is the venomous snake in bed with the children. But if the question is whether to kill it on the prairie or put it in bed with other children, I think we'd kill it!
  • Abraham Lincoln, "Speech at Hartford" (5 March 1860), Evening Press

• If the Republican Party of this nation shall ever have the national house entrusted to its keeping, it will be the duty of that party to attend to all the affairs of national housekeeping. Whatever matters of importance may come up, whatever difficulties may arise in the way of its administration of the government, that party will then have to attend to. It will then be compelled to attend to other questions... It is true that in the organization of the Republican party this question of Slavery was more important than any other; indeed, so much more important has it become that no other national question can even get a hearing just at present... Slavery is the question, the all absorbing topic of the day. It is true that all of us, and by that I mean, not the Republican Party alone, but the whole American people, here and elsewhere, all of us wish this question settled, wish it out of the way. It stands in the way, and prevents the adjustment, and the giving of necessary attention to other questions of national house-keeping. The people of the whole nation agree that this question ought to be settled, and yet it is not settled. And the reason is that they are not yet agreed how it shall be settled. All wish it done, but some wish one way and some another, and some a third, or fourth, or fifth; different bodies are pulling in different directions, and none of them having a decided majority, are able to accomplish the common object... To us it appears natural to think that slaves are human beings; men, not property; that some of the things, at least, stated about men in the Declaration of Independence apply to them as well as to us. I say, we think, most of us, that this Charter of Freedom applies to the slave as well as to ourselves, that the class of arguments put forward to batter down that idea, are also calculated to break down the very idea of a free government, even for white men, and to undermine the very foundations of free society. We think Slavery a great moral wrong, and while we do not claim the right to touch it where it exists, we wish to treat it as a wrong in the Territories, where our votes will reach it. We think that a respect for ourselves, a regard for future generations and for the God that made us, require that we put down this wrong where our votes will properly reach it. We think that species of labor an injury to free white men — in short, we think Slavery a great moral, social and political evil, tolerable only because, and so far as its actual existence makes it necessary to tolerate it, and that beyond that, it ought to be treated as a wrong.
  • Abraham Lincoln, "Allow the humblest man an equal chance" (6 March 1860), New Haven, Connecticut. As quoted in Lincoln on Democracy, by Mario Matthew Cuomo and G.S. Boritt, pp. 176-177

• I see the signs of the approaching triumph of the Republicans in the bearing of their political adversaries. A great deal of their war with us nowadays is mere bushwhacking.
  • Abraham Lincoln, Speech at New Haven, Connecticut (6 March 1860)

• We think slavery is wrong and ought to be restricted. That I suppose is the rub. It certainly is the only substantial difference.
  • Abraham Lincoln, as quoted in letter to Alexander H. Stephens (22 December 1860), Springfield, Illinois

• What in God's name has happened to the Republican Party? I hardly know any of these people!
  • Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., in 1960, as quoted in "1964 Republican Convention: Revolution From the Right: At the ugliest of Republican conventions since 1912, entrenched moderates faced off against conservative insurgents" (August 2008), by Rick Perlstein, Smithsonian Magazine

• We are Republicans, and we want Trump defeated.
  • The four co-founders of the Lincoln Project wrote in the New York Times according to [ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/02/15/inside-lincoln-project-claims-harassment-sexism-toxic-workplace/4483922001/ Inside the Lincoln Project’s ‘toxic’ workplace: Accusations of sexual harassment and a culture of infighting] February 15, 2021

• During the civil war, northern Democrats countered the Republican charge that they favored rebellion by profession to be the 'white man's party'. They protested the government's emancipation of slaves in the District of Columbia and its diplomatic recognition of Haiti. They claimed Republicans had nothing but 'nigger on the brain'. They were enraged when the U.S. Army accepted African American recruits; and they made race a paramount factor in their campaigns. In those days before television, parties held coordinated rallies. On the last Sunday before the election, Democratic senators might address crowds in each major city. Local officeholders would hold forth in smaller towns. Each of these rallies featured music. Hundreds of thousands of songbooks were printed so the party faithful might sing the same songs coast to coast. A favorite in 1864 was sung to the tune of 'Yankee Doodle Dandy'. The new national anthem, 'Nigger Doodle Dandy'.
  • James W. Loewen, Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong (2007), New York: New Press

• Songs such as 'Nigger Doodle Dandy' reflect the racist tone of the Democrats' presidential campaign in 1864. How did Republicans counter? In part, they sought white votes by being anti-racist. The Republican campaign, boosted by military victories in the fall of 1864, proved effective. The Democrats' overt appeals to racism failed, and anti-racist Republicans triumphed almost everywhere. One New York Republican wrote 'The change of opinion on this slavery question ... is a great and historic fact. Who could have predicted ... this great and blessed revolution?' People around the world supported the Union because of its ideology.
  • James W. Loewen, Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong (2007), New York: New Press, p. 192

• This gallant old party, this gallant old ship.
  • John Logan, as quoted in Republic: A Monthly Magazine (1873), p. 99

• Now comes the objection which you hear in the mouths of Democrats everywhere. Negro equality! Negro equality! The 'Black Republicans' are in favor of negro equality!
  • Owen Lovejoy, as quoted in His Brother's Blood: Speeches and Writings, 1838–64 (2004), edited by William Frederick Moore and Jane Ann Moore, p. 239

• The Republican Party, of which I am a member, stands pledged since 1856 to the extermination, so far as the federal government has the power, the twin relics of barbarism, slavery, and polygamy. They have this power in the territories of the United States.
  • Owen Lovejoy, speech (April 1860), as quoted in His Brother's Blood: Speeches and Writings, 1838–64, by Owen Lovejoy, William Frederick Moore, and Jane Ann Moore, p. 192

• The grand old party of human rights!
  • "Looking For A Policy", Republic: A Monthly Magazine (1873), p. 383

• [T]he Republican Party has gone to great lengths in recent years to distance itself from the taint of racism. George W. Bush is the first president to place African Americans in such key White House positions such as Secretary of State and National Security Adviser.
  • Joseph E. Lowndes, From the New Deal to the New Right (2008), p. 2

• African Americans identified their freedom with the Republican party. Blacks naturally identified with the party of Emancipation and an overwhelming share of African Americans steadfastly supported the GOP. Continuing black support for the Republicans during Reconstruction was not all surprising when one contrasts that vocal support for black rights offered by many Republicans, particularly fervent Radicals like Representative Thaddeus Stevens and Senator Charles Sumner, with the outright opposition to black political equality and support for Jim Crow by most Democrats. The few insincere, patronizing, and transparent attempts by Democratic politicians to solicit black votes failed. African Americans acted to support their political interests by voting Republican.
  • David Lublin, The Republican South: Democratization and Partisan Change, p. 10

• Revels was comparatively a new man in the community. He had recently been stationed at Natchez as pastor in charge of the AME Church, and so far as known he had never voted, had never attended a political meeting, and of course, had never made a political speech. But he was a colored man, and presumed to be a Republican, and believed to be a man of ability and considerably above the average in point of intelligence; just the man, it was thought, the Reverend Noah Buchanan would be willing to vote for... That prayer, one of the most impressive and eloquent prayers that had ever been delivered in the Senate Chamber, made Revels a United States Senator. He made a profound impression upon all who heard him. It impressed those who heard it that Revels was not only a man of great natural ability but that he was also a man of superior attainments.
  • John Lynch, as quoted in "Chapter III", The Facts of Reconstruction

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• The Democrats have moved to the right, and the Republicans have moved to a mental hospital.
  • Bill Maher, as quoted in "Johann Hari: Republicans, religion and the triumph of unreason", by Johann Hari, The Independent (19 August 2009)

• They made a Faustian deal with the racist devil years ago and now those chickens are coming home to roost.
  • Bill Maher, as quoted in "Bill Maher: GOP made a 'Faustian deal with the racist devil' and got Donald Trump as a result" (5 March 2016), by Kellan Howell, The Washington Times

• When Van Jones called the Republicans assholes, he was paying them a compliment. He was talking about how they can get things done even when they're in the minority, as opposed to the Democrats, who can't seem to get anything done even when they control both houses of Congress, the presidency, and Bruce Springsteen.
  • Bill Maher, in "New Rule: Float Like Obama, Sting Like Ali", The Huffington Post (11 September 2009)

• Only a Republican, perhaps only a Nixon, could have made this break and gotten away with it.
  • Mike Mansfield, U.S. Senate Democratic leader, as quoted in, in U.S. News and World Report (6 December 1971), on Nixon's pending trip to China; the phrase later became popular as "Only Nixon could go to China"

• For modern Republicans, being downright proud of their ignorance has become a badge of honor, a way to demonstrate loyalty to the right-wing cause while also sticking it to those liberal pinheads who think there's some kind of value in knowing what they're talking about before offering an opinion.
  • Amanda Marcotte, "Beyond the war on science: Why the right embraces ignorance as a virtue", Salon (June 13, 2014)

• Neither party should be defined by pandering to the outer reaches of American politics and the agents of intolerance.
  • John McCain, address at Virginia Beach (2000), as quoted at The Washington Post (28 February 2000)

• Of all the political organizations in America, none has had so hard a struggle for national existence as that known as the Republican Party of today; nor has any political party in any country or age achieved so much for the advance of human liberty and the elevation upon a common platform of the religious and civil equality of all men before the law.
  • Rolander Guy McClellan, Republicanism In America: A History of the Colonial and Republican Governments of the United States of America, from the Year 1607 to the Year 1869. to Which Is Added Constitutions, Proclamations, Platforms, Resolutions, Decisions of Courts, Laws Also A Brief History of All the Existing Republics in the World (1869)

• Etrigan, an alleged demon from Hell, will be running as a Republican.
  • "Political Asylum" part 2 (The Demon #27, published by DC Comics, 1992; written by Dwayne McDuffie)

• Southern political leaders were threatening to take their states out of the Union if a Republican president was elected on a platform restricting slavery.
  • James M. McPherson, This Mighty Scourge: Perspectives on the Civil War (2007), p. 188

• Men who dare to avow themselves here as Republicans should be promptly branded as the bitter and malignant enemies.
  • The Memphis Avalanche

• In this world of sin and sorrow there is always something to be thankful for. As for me, I rejoice that I am not a Republican.
  • H.L. Mencken, collected in A Mencken Chrestomathy (1949)

• I am the face of the Re-Pube-Licking Party.
  • Robert Morrow, GOP chairman for Travis County, Texas, as quoted in "Texas governor takes aim at 'caustic' tweeter who won county GOP race", Reuters

• My father likes to talk about the stroller accident that resulted in me becoming a Republican.
  • Mike Murphy, as quoted in "Romney guru thrives in political 'show business'" (12 June 2005), by Brian C. Mooney, The Boston Globe

• Republicans buy sneakers, too.
  • Michael Jordan, as quoted in [1] Did Michael Jordan really say “Republicans buy sneakers, too”?

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• The Republican Party was started in 1854 as the anti-slavery party by abolitionists opposed to keeping blacks in human bondage, and Republicans, under the leadership of President Abraham Lincoln, fought to free blacks from slavery. After the Civil War, Republicans amended the U.S. Constitution to grant blacks freedom, Thirteenth Amendment, citizenship, Fourteenth Amendment, and the right to vote, Fifteenth Amendment. Republicans passed the civil rights laws of the 1860s, including the Civil Rights Act of 1866 and the Reconstruction Act of 1867 that was designed to establish a new government system in the Democrat-controlled south, one that was fair to blacks. In the book The Political Lincoln: An Encyclopedia Professors Paul Finkleman and Martin J. Hershock debunk the absurd myth that President Lincoln was somehow a 'racist' because of his measured approach to ending slavery in the rebelling south first, while waging a war to end all slavery nationwide. If the Democrats had left blacks alone at this moment in history, our nation would not be faced with racial divisiveness today. Instead, Democrats set for themselves the horrendous task of keeping blacks in virtual slavery... The core socialist philosophy of the Democrats is to give a man a fish, so he can eat for a day. Socialism uses welfare, giving a man a fish, to keep blacks in poverty. The core enterprise philosophy of the Republicans is to teach a man how to fish so he can feed himself for a lifetime.
  • National Black Republican Association, "Civil Rights History" (2009), National Black Republican Association Newsletter

• We would, if the thing were possible, exclude the word Democracy altogether as unnecessary, and apt to mislead. 'We committed a great mistake,' said JOHN C. CALHOUN to us in 1840, 'when we dropped the name Republican and suffered ourselves to be called Democrats; names are things, and by adopting the name Democrat, we are led to substitute Democracy for the Constitutionalism founded by our fathers.' The Jeffersonian party, in JEFFERSON's days, never went by the name of the Democratic party, and to call, in our younger days, a member of that party a Democrat, was regarded as an insult. The party called itself officially Republican, and never assumed generally the name Democratic till the reelection of ANDREW JACKSON in 1832, when an effort was made to assimilate the American Republican party to the Democratic party of Europe.
  • The New York Times “WHAT IS DEMOCRACY?--ARE WE A DEMOCRATIC PEOPLE?; Democracy not an American Idea--The Fallacy of the Democratic Party--Its Failure and Final Extinction--A Republic Sustained by Justice, the American Idea” p. 5 (Feb. 28, 1864), NYT quoted Mr. Hickey from the Brownson's Quarterly Review

• The Republican Party committed a great public crime when it gave the right of suffrage to the blacks.
  • The New York Times, "The Political Future of the South" (10 May 1900)

• The Republican Party was, for a vital century, the major American political party that most frequently aligned with the cause of civil rights... Well into the twentieth century, many leading Republicans took seriously their party’s history and the responsibility that went with it. They worked to earn the votes of African-Americans and all supporters of equal justice under law... True to their word, top Republicans in Congress provided advice, counsel and support that was essential to the development and passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. While Democrats struggled with their party’s internal contradictions on the issue, deferring far too frequently to the demands of Southern segregationists who held powerful committee chairs in the House and Senate, and who commanded machines that delivered needed electoral votes, Republicans demanded action... When the key votes in the House and the Senate came fifty years ago, Republicans were significantly more supportive of the Civil Rights Act than were Democrats. The measure passed the House on a 290-130 vote, with support from 61 percent of House Democrats. 152 in favor, 96 opposed. But Republican lawmakers gave it 80 percent backing. 138 in support, just thirty-four against. The critical test came in the Senate in June 1964. Republicans aligned with northern Democrats to break the segregationist filibuster. Then, 82 percent of Republican senators backed the final passage of the measure, as opposed to two-thirds of Senate Democrats.
  • John Nichols, "When Republicans Really Were the Party of Lincoln: What happened to the party that fifty years ago played such a vital role in passing the Civil Rights Act?" (2 July 2014), The Nation

• Civil rights advocates within the Republican Party either left or were defeated. House minority leader Charles Halleck, the Indianan Republican who worked closely with the Johnson administration to pass muscular civil rights protections was deposed the following January by his own caucus. John Lindsay, who was rejected in his own party's 1969 New York City mayoral primary, winning instead on the Liberal Party line, became a Democrat in 1971. His ally in the 1963 civil rights push 'Mac' Mathias was so unsettled by the GOP's move to the right that he threatened to run for the presidency in 1976 as a progressive independent. Others champions of civil rights, such as Californian senator Thomas Kuchel, the Republican floor manager in the fights to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, New Jersey Senator Clifford Case and New York Senator Jacob Javits, would eventually lose primaries to conservative challengers... For a time in the 1950s and 1960s, enlightened Democrats and Republicans competed to be the party of civil rights, and the Republicans were in the lead through much of the period.
  • John Nichols, "When Republicans Really Were the Party of Lincoln: What happened to the party that fifty years ago played such a vital role in passing the Civil Rights Act?" (2 July 2014), The Nation

• There have been plenty of Republicans since, notably former Congressman Jack Kemp and former Secretary of State Colin Powell, who have sought to broaden the party’s focus and appeal. But as one of the great Republican advocates of civil rights, John Lindsay, noted when he left the GOP in 1971, 'Today the Republican Party has moved so far from what I perceive as necessary policies ... that I can no longer try to work within it'. John Avlon, the longtime speechwriter for New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani who has since become a prominent advocate for centrist projects such as the 'No Labels' movement, wrote several years ago: 'The Republican Party was right on civil rights for the first 100 years of its existence. It was right when the Democratic Party was wrong. Its future strength and survival will depend on rediscovering that legacy of individual freedom amid America's essential diversity. To win in the 21st century, the Party of Lincoln needs to start looking like the Party of Lincoln again'. This is true.
  • John Nichols, "When Republicans Really Were the Party of Lincoln: What happened to the party that fifty years ago played such a vital role in passing the Civil Rights Act?" (2 July 2014), The Nation

• Republicans have a right to reflect proudly on the role the GOP played in securing approval of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This anniversary belongs to both parties, to Democrats who recall Johnson's leadership, to Republicans who recall the role played by congressional Republicans. Unfortunately, the Republican Party that has spent much of its energy in recent years promoting restrictive Voter I.D. laws and that is currently entertaining a telling debate about Mississippi Senator Thad Cochran’s outreach to African-American voters in last month’s runoff election fight, often finds itself at odds with the legacies of Lincoln and the Republicans who championed civil rights in the mid-1960s... The Republican Party should take a very hard look at its past, and it should embrace that past.
  • John Nichols, "When Republicans Really Were the Party of Lincoln: What happened to the party that fifty years ago played such a vital role in passing the Civil Rights Act?" (2 July 2014), The Nation

• There is no room in the party of Lincoln for a Klansman.
  • Jim Nicholson, as quoted in "Klansman Has Been Problem for GOP" (21 December 1998), by Thomas B. Edsal, The Washington Post.

• Let's not forget that The Great Emancipator, the president who spent his legal and political career making some of the most persuasive, moral, common sense, and elegant cases against slavery in our nation’s history, was a Republican. Oh, and he freed the slaves, and since that time, we have always been the 'Party of Lincoln'.
  • John Nolte, as quoted in "Washington Post Catches Democrats Rewriting Their Civil Rights History" (6 September 2012), by J. Nolte, Breitbart.

• The pandemic, explained the Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson, was the definitive ‘end of the neoliberal era inaugurated by Thatcher and Reagan’. We don’t just hear that from Social Democrats these days. Now right-wing populists, journalists and economists also claim that ‘the Reagan/Thatcher era is over’. These two leaders are often used as symbols of the era of economic liberalization in the early 1980s, and I agree that it feels an awful lot like that era has come to an end. Donald Trump’s advisor Stephen Moore declared that the Republicans are no longer Reagan’s party but Trump’s, and that’s exactly how the party comes across in their recent agitation against free trade, immigration and tech companies, not to mention lies about election fraud. (Reagan once called the peaceful transfer of power the ‘magic’ of the free world.)
  • Johan Norberg, The Capitalist Manifesto: Why the Global Free Market Will Save the World (2023)

• The Republican Party values polluter wealth over public health.
  • Dana Nuccitelli, "Republicans have so corrupted EPA, Americans can only save it in the voting booth", The Guardian, 30 April 2018.

• GOP, your very existence is on the line here. Show some honesty or you’re done.
  • Ted Nugent, about Republican Party's stances on Donald Trump. Give Trump the Medal of Freedom, WorldNetDaily (August 7, 2015)

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• And as far as the budget goes, it's time for responsible Republicans who share these goals - and there are a number of folks out there who I think are decent folks, I've got some disagreements with them on some issues, but I think genuinely want to see the economy grow and want what's best for the American people - it's time for those Republicans to step up and they've got to decide what they want to prioritize.
  • Barack Obama, remarks at the White House (16 September 2013)

• The Democrats are the party that says government will make you smarter, taller, richer, and remove the crabgrass on your lawn. Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work, and then they get elected and prove it.
  • P. J. O'Rourke‎, Parliament of Whores (1991)

• The difference between American parties is actually simple. Democrats are in favor of higher taxes to pay for greater spending, while Republicans are in favor of greater spending, for which the taxpayers will pay. In foreign policy, Republicans intend to pursue the war in Iraq but to do so with a minimal number of troops on the ground. This is not to be confused with the disastrous Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld policy of using a minimal number of troops on the ground to pursue the war in Iraq. Democrats intend to end the war, but they don't know when. Democrats are making the 'high school sex promise': I'll pull out in time, honest!
  • P. J. O'Rourke‎, "Letter to Our European Friends" (4 February 2008)

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• While Republicans argued over economic directions, they stayed united on the greatest issue of the day, slavery. They were the party of emancipation, the first major party in American history that unequivocally advocated the end of slavery. Republicans had family fights about emancipation, but these were fights about speed more than destination, about means, seldom about ends. During the war, the party emancipated slaves, armed them, expanded their rights at the state and national level, and protected them with the force of arms. By the end of the war many Republicans were calling for black suffrage. Race issues most fundamentally divided the parties. In 1862 the Congress voted on slavery-related questions, emancipation in the District of Columbia, outlawing slavery in the territories, ordering soldiers not to return runaway slaves, and a confiscation act freeing slaves of disloyal masters. On these issues, 96 percent of the Democrats voted 'No'; 99 percent of the Republicans voted 'Yes'.
  • Phillip Shaw Paludan, "War is the Health of the Party: Republicans in the American Civil War", as quoted in The Birth of the Grand Old Party: The Republicans' First Generation (2002), edited by Robert F. Engs and Randall M. Miller, Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania Press, p. 65

• Listening to the Republicans talk about the economy and economic policy, however, is like entering into an alternative reality.
  • Steven Pearlstein, "The magical world of voodoo 'economists'" (20 September 2011), The Washington Post, Washington, D.C.

• On the issue of slavery, Democrats fought for and gave their lives to expand it while Republicans fought and gave their lives to ban it. Some called it the Civil War, others called it the 'War Between the States'. But to African Americans and President Lincoln it was the war between the Democrats and Republicans concerning the states' rights to maintain the institution of slavery.
  • Wayne Perryman, letter to Terry McAuliffe (5 April 2004)

• In 1854, the anti-slavery members of the Democratic Party joined forces with the abolitionists and formed a new political party. They called themselves the Republican Party. Their primary goal and mission was to end slavery and give blacks the same rights afforded to white citizens.
  • Wayne Perryman, as quoted in Whites, Blacks, and Racist Democrats (2009)

• The Republican Party is coming apart … state party fratricide is growing, factions are trying to scuttle other factions' congressional candidates. [...] GOP is on the verge of reaching critical non-mass.
  • Kevin Phillips, as quoted in The American Political Report (25 June 1976)
  • From archives of Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library

• The more Negroes who register as Democrats in the South, the sooner the Negrophobe whites will quit the Democrats and become Republicans.
  • Kevin Phillips, Nixon's Southern strategy, 'It's All In the Charts', May 17, 1970

• For a party that desperately yearns to increase its diversity, why not answer this way? I'm from the party of Abraham Lincoln. The only flag I want to salute is the American flag.
  • Scott Pinsker, as quoted in "Republicans: The Confederate flag and the party of Lincoln" (22 June 2015), Fox News.

• There's also a dark vein of intolerance in some parts of the party. What do I mean by that? What I mean by that is they still sort of look down on minorities.
  • Colin L. Powell, as quoted in Meet the Press (2013), NBC

• The majority of Republicans are not conservative.
  • Dennis Prager, "The Scariest Reason Trump Won" (10 May 2016), National Review

• In 1854, the Whig Party collapsed and the Republican Party was born. The Republicans were the anti-slavery party. Neither party could at the time claim the mantle of truly supporting equality and civil rights, but of the two, the Republicans were clearly the party that sought to abolish slavery. The Democrats have no claim at all to supporting civil rights at that time. The election of Republican abolition supporter Abraham Lincoln in 1860 was met by the southern Democrats with secession. The Democrats started a war to divide the country in order to preserve slavery.
  • Bryan Preston, "Democrats Airbrush Pro-Slavery, Civil War and Segregation from Their History" (4 September 2012), PJMedia

• The Republican Party is strong enough to dare to do right and cannot afford to shirk a duty. The colored men North and South were loyal to the Government in the days of its greatest peril. There was not a rebel or a traitor to be found among them. They ask the privilege of citizenship now that slavery has been forever banished from our country. Why should the great freedom-loving State of Iowa longer deny them this right? No one reason can be given that has not been used to bolster up slavery for the last hundred years. The war that has just closed has swept that relic of barbarism from our land; let the Republican Party have the courage to do justice... I have no fear of the result in a contest of this kind. We shall carry the election and have the satisfaction of wiping out the last vestige of the black code that has long been a disgrace to our State.
  • Hiram Price, as quoted in History of Iowa, Volume III, Chapter 1

• Some say that Republicans shouldn't bother engaging with the black community. It’s a lost cause, they say, pointing to single-digit support in previous presidential elections. We disagree. We know when we engage, we win, and moreover black America wins. Just last November, in Ohio, one in four black men voted for your Republican governor. They voted their values. This kind of voter engagement can make a big difference. And given the opportunity to make the choice, black voters can help us open doors that expand opportunity for all. As Chairman, I have made this a priority because no voter should be overlooked, and no voter should be taken for granted.
  • Reince Priebus, "Why Black Americans Can Vote Their Values And Vote Republican"

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• When we call to mind the fact that this persecution is waged against men for the simple reason that they dare vote with the party that saved the Union intact by the lavish expenditure of blood and treasure, and has borne the nation safely through the fearful crisis of these last few years, our hearts swell with an overwhelming indignation... We are fully determined to stand by the Republican Party and the government... It has been asserted on this floor that the Republican Party is answerable for the existing state of affairs in the south. I am here to deny this, and to illustrate, I will say that in the State of South Carolina there is no disturbance of an alarming character in any one of the counties in which the Republicans have a majority. The troubles are usually in those sections in which the Democrats have a predominance in power, and, not content with this, desire to be supreme..
  • Joseph Hayne Rainey, speech on the Ku Klux Klan Bill of 1871 (1 April 1871)

• But we do want a law enacted that we may be recognized like other men in the country. Why is it that colored members of Congress cannot enjoy the same immunities that are accorded to white members? Why cannot we stop at hotels here without meeting objection? Why cannot we go into restaurants without being insulted? We are here enacting laws for the country and casting votes upon important questions; we have been sent here by the suffrages of the people, and why cannot we enjoy the same benefits that are accorded to our white colleagues on this floor? I say to you gentlemen, that this discrimination against the negro race in this country is unjust, is unworthy of a high-minded people whose example should have a salutary influence in the world.
  • Joseph Hayne Rainey, speech about the Civil Rights Act under consideration which was passed in 1875 (19 December 1873), as quoted in Neglected Voices, New York University School of Law

• We intend to continue to vote so long as the government gives us the right and necessary protection; and I know that right accorded to us now will never be withheld in the future if left to the Republican Party.
  • Joseph Hayne Rainey, speech on the Civil Rights Bill (3 February 1875), as quoted in the Congressional Record, 43rd Congress, 2nd Session, Vol 3, p. 959

• When the chips are down and the decisions are made as to who the candidates will be, then the 11th commandment prevails and everybody goes to work, and that is: Thou shalt not speak ill of another Republican.
  • Ronald Reagan, in remarks in New York City at a Reception for Delegates to the State Republican Convention (17 June 1982), restating "The Eleventh Commandment" by California Republican Party Chairman Gaylord Parkinson, which Reagan first used in 1966

• We don't intend to turn the Republican Party over to the traitors in the battle just ended. We will have no more of those candidates who are pledged to the same goals of our opposition and who seek our support. Turning the party over to the so-called moderates wouldn't make any sense at all.
  • Ronald Reagan, as quoted in Exit with Honor: The Life and Presidency of Ronald Reagan (2015), by William E. Pemberton, p. 64

• I hope you're all Republican.
  • Ronald Reagan, speaking to surgeons as he entered the operating room following a 1981 assassination attempt.[2] To which Dr. Joseph Giordano replied, "We're all Republicans today."
  • An alternative version has Reagan saying "Please tell me you're Republicans." (30 March 1981).

• I think it is much easier to be a good member of the Church and a Democrat than a good member of the Church and a Republican.
  • Harry Reid, as quoted in BYU Newsnet (2001).

• The Republican Party and the abolitionist movement both were originally established to defend those who could not defend themselves, mainly American slaves who were not considered human but were considered property. The principle of the sanctity of human life is a core value of the Republican Party which has advocated that the unborn child has a fundamental right to life which cannot be infringed.
  • Republican National Convention Platform Committee, "Wealth Agenda for Urban America: Upward Mobility For All", Black and African-American Republicans.

• This district, as much if not more than any in the land, illustrates the effect of Republican principles. Its school-houses are open to rich and poor alike. Every ballot falls as free and unchecked as the leaves from the trees or the snow-flakes from the sky. The man who would change or coerce or conceal one of those evidences of a freeman's will, could not breathe our air or live upon our soil. Our financial institutions, safely through the depression consequent upon the war, are prosperous and attest the wisdom of the system of which they are a part... We do not want them changed. Our manufacturing interests, in all their manifold varieties, are prospering again under the influence of Republican principles. The hum of every spindle is the music of republicanism, and every steam cloud curling above our cities and villages is a spray in its wreath. Our farmers are rich and prosperous in their contiguity to the market of our cities and villages. We want no change; we adhere to the old cause and will be found among the foremost in the grand rally about to be made for the integrity of the government and the preservation of business prosperity, for the equality of the law, and the protection of all in the enjoyment of their legal rights; for the great principles of nationality, liberty, and union.
  • William Rice, speech to the state GOP convention (1880)

• The Republican Party is simply not interested in small government now. They're worse than the Democrats they replaced.
  • Brian Riedl, a budget analyst at the Heritage Foundation, as quoted in "US spending surges to historic level" by Gail Russell Chaddock, in The Christian Science Monitor (8 December 2003)

• The Republicans are the party of faith and family. When did we become the party of child abuse?
  • Geraldo Rivera, 2018 Geraldo Rivera and Hannity Erupt Over Border Policy: ‘When Did We Become the Party of Child Abuse?!’

• Early in 1964 I wrote a Speaking Out piece for The Saturday Evening Post. A Barry Goldwater victory would insure that the GOP would be completely the white man's party. What happened at San Francisco when Senator Goldwater became the Republican standard-bearer confirmed my prediction.

  I wasn't altogether caught of guard by the victory of the reactionary forces in the Republican party, but I was appalled by the tactics they used to stifle their liberal opposition. I was a special delegate to the convention through an arrangement made by the Rockefeller office. That convention was one of the most unforgettable and frightening experiences of my life. The hatred I saw was unique to me because it was hatred directed against a white man. It embodied a revulsion for all he stood for, including his enlightened attitude toward black people. A new breed of Republicans had taken over the GOP. As I watched this steamroller operation in San Francisco, I had a better understanding of how it must have felt to be a Jew in Hitler’s Germany.

  • Jackie Robinson, as quoted in The Last Love Song: A Biography of Joan Didion (2011), by Tracy Daughtery
  • Also quoted in I Never Had It Made (1972), by Jackie Robinson, as told to Alfred Duckett

• The Republican Party has told the black man to go to hell. I offer them a similar invitation.
  • Jackie Robinson, on 24 August 1968, as quoted in Jackie Robinson: An Integrated Life, by J. Christopher Schutz

• It’s not a real choice. It’s an apparent choice. Like choosing a brand of detergent. Whether you buy Ivory Snow or Tide, they’re both owned by Proctor & Gamble. This doesn’t mean that... the Democrats and Republicans are the same. Of course, they’re not. Neither are Tide and Ivory Snow.
  • Arundhati Roy: Tide? Or Ivory Snow? Public Power in the Age of Empire, Speech, San Francisco, California(16 August 2004)

• For the GOP to succeed, we need a hopeful, inclusive and realistic agenda.
  • Jennifer Rubin, "The speech Republicans need to give" (7 June 2016), The Washington Post, Washington, D.C.

• We cannot be a party that nominates someone who refuses to condemn white supremacists and the Ku Klux Klan.
  • Marco Rubio, referring to Donald Trump Twitter (28 February 2016)

• The Republican Party is the party of the open door. Ours is the party of liberty, the party of equality, of opportunity for all, and favoritism for none... Participation in a Republican primary, caucus, or any meeting or convention held for the purpose of electing, selecting, allocating, or binding delegates and alternate delegates to a county, district, state, or national convention shall in no way be abridged for reasons of sex, race, religion, color, age, or national origin. The Republican National Committee and the state Republican Party or governing committee of each state shall take positive action to achieve the broadest possible participation by men and women, young people, minority and heritage groups, senior citizens, and all other citizens in the delegate election, selection, allocation, or binding process.
  • The Rules of the Republican Party (27 August 2012)

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• I have been involved very much in the partisan plan, which is something that I think the American people desperately want. And the truth of the matter is, there are a lot of people in our country, working-class people, who are losing faith in the ability of government to address their needs. And what we are doing is just that... Let Mr. Barrasso go to the folks in Wyoming and ask them whether they think it's a good idea that they should be paying a third of their income in child care. Ask elderly people who don't have any teeth in their mouth whether they should be able to get dentures through Medicare. Ask the scientific community whether the time is now in a big way to deal with climate. Ask the ordinary American consumer whether we should take on the greed of the pharmaceutical industry, which charges us the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs. What makes the Republicans very nervous — and they are — it is true, they are — is they know that this is an extremely popular set of proposals long overdue. And, in fact, by demanding that the wealthy and large corporations start paying their fair share of taxes, we're going to pay for it in a progressive way.
  • Bernie Sanders, Sanders: GOP ‘nervous’ about ‘overdue’ progressive policies in budget, infrastructure bill, PBS Newshour (20 July 2021)

• There's no reason for Republicans to waste any time on black voters; there are no votes there under any conditions. Rand Paul went to Ferguson and Baltimore to talk racial healing: no one cared or even noticed.
  • Crispin Sartwell, White Liberals: We’re Not Racist, Splice Today (August 29, 2016)

• Many democrats, liberals, traditional conservatives, and even some leftists continue to tell themselves that the election of Joe Biden was the first step toward restoring U.S. standing in the world after the damage caused by Donald Trump. And in a variety of ways — many stylistic and some substantive — that perspective has merit. But when it comes to national security policy, the U.S. has been on a steady, hypermilitarized arc for decades. Taken broadly, U.S. policy has been largely consistent on “national security” and “counterterrorism” matters from 9/11 to the present....
  There will be no major departures from the imperial course under Biden. While the drone wars continue, and the shift back to Cold War posturing in Europe and Asia accelerates, Biden will maintain the hostile stance toward left movements and governments throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. On climate change, Biden will reverse some of Trump’s most extreme stances, while still placing the profits of major corporations and the military industry over the health of the planet. The militarization of the borders and the maltreatment of refugees will remain, and the vast domestic surveillance apparatus will endure. The stark truth is this: The interests of the War Party trump any political disputes between the Democrats and the Republicans.
  • Jeremy Scahill, The War Party, From Bush to Obama, and Trump to Biden, U.S. Militarism Is the Great Unifier, The Intercept (November 21 2021)

• I finally arrived here in 1968. What a special day it was. I remember I arrived here with empty pockets but full of dreams, full of determination, full of desire. The presidential campaign was in full swing. I remember watching the Nixon-Humphrey presidential race on TV. A friend of mine who spoke German and English translated for me. I heard Humphrey saying things that sounded like socialism, which I had just left. But then I heard Nixon speak. He was talking about free enterprise, getting the government off your back, lowering the taxes and strengthening the military. Listening to Nixon speak sounded more like a breath of fresh air. I said to my friend, I said, 'What party is he?' My friend said, 'He's a Republican'. I said, 'Then I am a Republican'. And I have been a Republican ever since.
  • Arnold Schwarzenegger, Republican National Convention speech (31 August 2004), as quoted in "Schwarzenegger: No country more welcoming than the USA" (31 August 2004), CNN

• My fellow immigrants, my fellow Americans how do you know if you are a Republican? I’ll tell you how. If you believe that government should be accountable to the people, not the people to the government, then you are a Republican! If you believe a person should be treated as an individual, not as a member of an interest group, then you are a Republican! If you believe your family knows how to spend your money better than the government does, then you are a Republican! If you believe our educational system should be held accountable for the progress of our children, then you are a Republican! If you believe this country, not the United Nations, is the best hope of democracy in the world, then you are a Republican! If you believe that the American Dream can be reachable if you work hard enough to earn it, then you are a Republican! And, ladies and gentlemen, if you believe we must be fierce and relentless and terminate terrorism, then you are a Republican! There is another way you can tell you're a Republican. You have faith in free enterprise, faith in the resourcefulness of the American people, and faith in the U.S. economy.
  • Arnold Schwarzenegger, Republican National Convention speech (31 August 2004), as quoted in "Schwarzenegger: No country more welcoming than the USA" (31 August 2004), CNN

• The most important thing is that we need to be a party that is inclusive and tolerant. We can be those things and be the party we always have been. We need to think about the environment. Teddy Roosevelt was a great environmentalist and people forget Reagan was the one who dealt with the ozone layer with the Montreal protocol. We also need to talk about healthcare honestly. Nixon almost passed universal healthcare. We need to have an talk about immigration and realize you can't just deport people. We need a comprehensive answer. We also need to stay out of people's bedrooms. The party that is for small government shouldn't be over-reaching into people's private lives. Mainly, we need to be a party where people know what we are for, not just what we are against.
  • Arnold Schwarzenegger, Reddit

• The Republican Party is composed entirely of the colored people.
  • E.W. Seibels, testimony to the Joint Select Committee to Inquire Into the Condition of Affairs in the Southern States (22 June 1871).

• We are Republicans. But we are Americans first. It is as Americans that we express our concern with the growing confusion that threatens the security and stability of our country. Democrats and Republicans alike have contributed to that confusion.
  • Margaret Chase Smith, Declaration of Conscience (1 June 1950)

• What I dream is that for one election, just one, every black person in America vote Republican... Black folks in America are telling one party, 'We don't give a damn about you'. They're telling the other party 'You’ve got our vote'. Therefore, you have labeled yourself 'disenfranchised' because one party knows they've got you under their thumb. The other party knows they'll never get you and nobody comes to address your interest.
  • Stephen Smith, as quoted in "How You See It: Perceptions of (In)Equality" (March 2015), Vanderbilt University

• As far as party primaries are concerned, both Republican and Democratic Party primaries are dominated by the most zealous voters, whose views may not reflect the views of most members of their own respective parties, much less the views of those who are going to vote in the November general election.
  In recent times, each election year has seen each party's nominee selected - or at least subject to veto - by its most extreme wing and then forced to try to move back to the center before the general election.
  This can only undermine the public's confidence in the integrity of the candidates of both parties.
  • Thomas Sowell, "Bipartisan Primary Blues", National Review (25 March 2008)

• A new party was formed, called the Republican Party, to resist the Democratic Party in its new and alarming attitude of pro-slavery aggression... This new party was made up of Northern men from the ruins of the old Whig party, the Free-Soil Democracy and all friends of true republican liberty who desired to see the Sham Democracy overthrown, and the National Government brought back to the principles of Washington and Jefferson and the fathers of the Republic... The Republican Party recognizes the right of the majority to govern, and their power to enforce that right against all attempts- at disunion, come from what quarter they may. It is based upon the great fundamental principle upon which the National Government rests, that the Constitution, and all laws made in pursuance thereof, are to be faithfully observed and enforced, and it demands economy and a rigid accountability on the part of all public officers... The Republican Party insists that slavery originated in force, by the stronger against the weaker party, and not by natural right; that it is maintained and upheld by oppression and wrong, and against the law of nature. This usurped ownership in man is not that kind of property which is recognized by the general consent of mankind. The advanced state of civilized society does not recognize the right of one man to own another man against his will. The inalienable right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, is conceded to all. The right of every man to himself, to enjoy the fruits of his own ingenuity and industry, are among the natural rights of every person made in the image of God... The Republican Party was organized in 1854-55, upon the platform of liberty and independence, to maintain the union of the States and the rights of the States; freedom of speech and the press; to resist the spread of slavery and the aggressions of the slave power; the equal rights of all persona to impartial protection at home and abroad, and in the enjoyment of religious freedom; and of all American citizens, whether native or naturalized, to the free exercise of the elective franchise and the enjoyment of its benefits; and requiring no test for office except honesty, capacity, and devotion to American institutions... Accessions have continually been made to the Republican Party, ever since its organization, it has won to the support of its principles good men, from time to time, from all the other parties, until it now embraces the best men of the country. It has become a compact and overshadowing organization, sufficiently powerful to take possession of and to administer the Government, upon the great principles of liberty, equality, and justice, as embodied in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States.
  • Elbridge Spaulding, speech (May 1860)

• In meetings, I've heard Republicans say to me that black people are Republicans, they just don't know it yet. I don't need you to tell me I'm conservative because I go to church. What I like about Rand Paul is that he doesn't make that presumption. He has taken affirmative steps to become more aware of how black people view certain issues. But he has been forthright about what he is willing and capable of doing.
  • Michael Steele, as quoted in "How Rand Paul learned to talk to black people" (30 April 2015), by N.M. Henderson, CNN, Cable News Network.

• This war against women started a long time ago with old Democrats who took over the Republican Party, which was, before that, the very first to support the Equal Rights Amendment. Even when the National Women's Political Caucus started, there was a whole Republican feminist entity. But beginning with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, right-wing Democrats like Jesse Helms began to leave the Democratic Party and gradually take over the GOP. So I always feel I have to apologize to my friends who are Republicans because they've basically lost their party. Ronald Reagan couldn't get nominated today because he was supportive of immigrant rights. Barry Goldwater was pro-choice. George H.W. Bush supported Planned Parenthood. No previous Republicans except for George W. Bush would be acceptable to the people who now run the GOP. They are not Republicans. They are the American version of the Taliban... They've taken over one of our two great parties. This causes people to wrongly think that the country is equally divided but if we look at the public opinion polls, it isn't. So, I can't think of anything more crucial than real Republicans taking back the GOP... I think feminists and progressive Democrats err when they accusingly say to Republican women, 'How can you be a Republican?' Nobody responds to that. But if you say, 'Look, you didn't leave your party. The party left you'. Let's just look at the issues and see what they are and forget about party labels and vote for ourselves', I think people would really respond.
  • Gloria Steinem, interview, after being chosen "2012 Humanist of the Year" (7 June 2012), as published in "The Humanist Interview with Gloria Steinem" in The Humanist (September / October 2012)

• Indeed there are some Republicans I would trust with anything — anything, that is, except public office.
  • Adlai Ewing Stevenson, campaign speech, Illinois state fair, Springfield, Illinois (August 14, 1952); in Major Campaign Speeches of Adlai E. Stevenson, 1952 (1953), p. 14.

• I've always voted Republican because the beliefs of my party mirror those of our founding fathers who gave life to America long ago. Next to my faith, my political views are something I'm proud of.
  • Gale Storm, interview, TV Legends (1999).

T

• We favor strengthening our common American identity and loyalty, which includes the contribution and assimilation of different racial and ethnic groups.
  • Texan Republican Party Platform of 2014 (June 2014), by the Republican Party of Texas

• Democratic primary voters may respond to disruption, rudeness and incivility, but Republicans and the persuadable independents the GOP needs to win in the 2016 election will be unimpressed. Those persuadable voters are also watching how Republicans respond — which is why Republicans who encounter Black Lives Matter protesters should resist the temptation to go Chris Christie on them. Instead, they should follow the lead of Ben Carson and use the protests as an opportunity to point out that the Democratic policies of the Obama era are failing our most vulnerable citizens. Carson didn’t wait for the protesters to come to him. He took his campaign to Harlem last week to make the case that the GOP has better solutions for the challenges of poverty, dependency and lack of mobility... That is precisely the message every Republican candidate should be delivering. When confronted by Black Lives Matter protesters, Republicans should declare that they fully agree — black lives do matter — but that the policies of the past seven years have not made black lives better. They should point out that the African American youth unemployment rate in July 2015 was 31 percent — more than double that of whites, at 14.4 percent. To put that figure in perspective, in 1932 — the very worst point of the Great Depression — the national unemployment rate was 22.9 percent. So for young black men and women today, the employment rates of the Great Depression would be a step up from those of the Obama 'recovery'.
  • Marc Thiessen, "Republicans should follow Ben Carson’s lead on Black Lives Matter" (17 August 2015), The Washington Post (2015), Washington, D.C.

• Tillman was from South Carolina, and as I hear the story he was concerned that the corporations, Republican corporations, were favorable toward blacks and he felt that there was a need to regulate them.
  • Clarence Thomas, as quoted in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (February 2010)

• Most of the blacks in the late 1950s and at least up to 1960 were Republican. Our party was sympathetic to them and the Democrats were the ones enforcing 'Jim Crow' laws and segregation.
  • Fletcher Thompson, as quoted in "Registration Unknown, Martin Luther King Was Likely Republican" (1 September 2013), by John Gizzi, NewsMax

• Republicanism means Negro equality, while the Democratic Party means that the white man is supreme.
  • Benjamin Tillman, speech (1906)

• In Chicago, the Republicans needed the Negro vote to elect their whole ticket, so a nigger was nominated for judge and elected.
  • Benjamin Tillman, speech (1906)

• Rather than being the 'stupid party', Republicans became the party of ideas. Neoconservatism's task was, he said, to 'convert the Republican Party and American conservatism in general, against their respective wills, into a new kind conservative politics suitable to governing a modern democracy'.
  • Jonathan Tobin, "The power of ideas", The Jerusalem Post (29 September 2009)

• I have been studying the Republican Party for over 12 years at close hand in the Capital of the United States. And by this time, I have discovered where the Republicans stand on most of the major issues. Since they won't tell you themselves, I am going to tell you. They approve of the American farmer—but they are willing to help him go broke. They stand four-square for the American home—but not for housing. They are strong for labor—but they are stronger for restricting labor's rights. They favor a minimum wage—the smaller the minimum the better. They indorse educational opportunity for all—but they won't spend money for teachers or for schools. They think modern medical care and hospitals are fine—for people who can afford them. They approve of social security benefits—so much so that they took them away from almost a million people. ... They think the American standard of living is a fine thing—so long as it doesn't spread to all the people. And they admire the Government of the United States so much that they would like to buy it.
  • Harry S. Truman, address in Saint Paul, Minnesota at the Municipal Auditorium, October 13, 1948, in Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Harry S. Truman, 1948, Volume 4, p. 773

• I've seen it happen time after time. When the Democratic candidate allows himself to be put on the defensive and starts apologizing for the New Deal and the fair Deal, and says he really doesn't believe in them, he is sure to lose. The people don't want a phony Democrat. If it's a choice between a genuine Republican, and a Republican in Democratic clothing, the people will choose the genuine article, every time; that is, they will take a Republican before they will a phony Democrat, and I don't want any phony Democratic candidates in this campaign.
  • Harry S. Truman, address at the National Convention Banquet of the Americans for Democratic Action (17 May 1952)

• Republicans didn't have anything going for them with respect to Latinos and with respect to Asians.
  • Donald Trump, interview with Newsmax (November 2012)

W

• I was a Republican because I thought that those were the people who best supported markets. I think that is not true anymore.
  • Elizabeth Warren, as quoted in "Elizabeth Warren: ‘I Created Occupy Wall Street’", by Samuel P. Jacobs, at The Daily Beast (published October 24, 2011; updated July 13, 2017)

• I never use the words Democrats and Republicans. It's liberals and Americans.
  • James G. Watt, in a statement of November 1981, quoted in New York Times (10 October 1983); also quoted in Energy and Environment : The Unfinished Business (1986) by Congressional Quarterly, Inc., p. 91

• I was a little bit skeptical based on some things I've heard and I've seen from other Republicans. I wanted someone to pick up on that Jack Kemp model and I wanted him to understand that it's the justice issues, or the injustice, that keep black people from voting Republican. He has listened and learned and has been able to take on things that most Republicans would be afraid of.
  • Julius C. Watts, as quoted in "How Rand Paul learned to talk to black people" (30 April 2015), by N.M. Henderson, CNN, Cable News Network

• On March 20, 1854, the Republican Party was established in Ripon, Wisconsin. Referred to as the 'GOP' or 'Grand Old Party', it established for one reason, to break the chains of slavery and ensure the unalienable rights endowed by the Creator of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness would be for all Americans. The Republican Party was created to achieve individual freedom. Then, as now, the antagonist to the Republican Party has been the Democrats, the party of collective subjugation and individual enslavement, then physical, now economic.
  • Allen B. West, "LBJ: I'll have those niggers voting Democratic for the next 200 years." (20 March 2014), Allen B. West: Steadfast and Loyal

• The antagonist to the Republican Party has been the Democrats, the party of collective subjugation and individual enslavement. Then physical, now economic. The first black members of the U.S. House and Senate were Republicans. The first civil rights legislation came from Republicans. Democrats gave us the KKK, Jim Crow, lynchings, poll taxes, literacy tests, and failed policies like the 'Great Society'. Republican President Eisenhower ordered troops to enforce school desegregation. Republican Senator Everett Dirksen enabled the 1964 civil rights legislation to pass, in opposition to Democrat Senators Robert Byrd, a KKK Grand Wizard, and Al Gore, Sr.
  • Allen B. West, "LBJ: I'll have those niggers voting Democratic for the next 200 years." (20 March 2014), Allen B. West: Steadfast and Loyal

• Who are the real racists? So far, thanks to a Republican Party that is ignorant of its own history and gave up on the black community, Democrats have fifty of those two hundred years under their belt. The problem with today's Republican Party is that it has forgotten its own history and raison d'etre. Individual liberty. The party must come to realize that GOP also stands for 'Growth, Opportunity, Prosperity' and articulate how it stands, as its history and founding clearly demonstrate, for the individual pursuit of happiness as opposed to the progressive socialist Democrat lie of a collective guarantee of happiness. So, happy 160th birthday to my party, the Republican Party. I am a strong conservative and I hope Republicans recommit to those fundamental principles which established this party, the historical antithesis of the Democrats.
  • Allen Bernard West, "LBJ: I'll have those niggers voting Democratic for the next 200 years." (20 March 2014), Allen B. West: Steadfast and Loyal

• The truth is that it is a culture of dependency as promulgated by the race-baiters and new plantation overseers of the inner city that has created what we’re seeing play out in Baltimore. There is where the blame lies, but there are very few who are willing to admit just that. Remember what ESPN sports commentator Stephen A. Smith said? He wished that for one voting cycle, the black community would vote Republican. Heck, they could do no worse — and look, even the people of the State of Maryland decided to try something different and elected a Republican governor. Who, when finally asked, immediately activated the National Guard to quell the violence and chaos which the Democrat Mayor of Baltimore failed to comprehend, and control. Perhaps what we’re witnessing in Baltimore is the pure definition of insanity — continuing to do the same thing and expect different results.
  • Allen B. West, "The dirty little secret no one wants to admit about Baltimore" (18 May 2015), National Black Republican Association

• Lincoln and the Republican Party of the 1850s were able to mobilize a national majority against the expansion of slavery only because of the commitment the founders had made to the proposition that all men are created equal. The Republican opposition to slavery led to secession and civil war. After the border slave states had become committed to the war effort Lincoln took his earliest practical opportunity to announce the Emancipation Proclamation. From then on, the war for the Union became a war to abolish slavery... The founders believed that their compromises with slavery would be corrected in the course of American history after the union was formed. Their belief turned out to be true, although the new birth of freedom proved to be less inevitable and more costly than they had anticipated. The civil war fulfilled the antislavery promise of the American founding. Lincoln was right, and today's consensus is wrong. America really was 'conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal'. Under the principles of the declaration and the law of the constitution, blacks won their liberty, became equal citizens, gained the right to vote, and eventually had their life, liberty, and property equally protected by the law. But today the founding, which made all this possible is denounced as unjust and anti-black. Surely that uncharitable verdict deserves to be reversed.
  • Thomas G. West, Vindicating the Founders (2001), Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., pp. 35–36

• As the 2024 election draws near, voters are dissatisfied with both Joe Biden and Donald Trump: 59 percent do not want Biden to run again; 56 percent feel the same way about Trump...
  The real threat to the two-party system comes from the Republican Party. Donald Trump destroyed the Republican establishment and transformed the party into his own personal organization. Stunningly, the thrice-indicted Trump is the leading GOP candidate who could be seeking the presidency next year from a jail cell. Trump’s hold on the GOP stems from the grievances of his mostly white, blue-collar supporters. Reporting to the federal courthouse for his third arrest, Trump posted on Truth Social: “IT IS A GREAT HONOR, BECAUSE I AM BEING ARRESTED FOR YOU.” Historically, the Republican establishment played a major role in presenting honorable candidates with experience in government who adhered to conservative principles. The Grand Old Party prided itself in nominating Thomas E. Dewey, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Gerald R. Ford, Ronald Reagan, the two Bushes, John McCain and Mitt Romney. When another establishment-endorsed candidate, Richard Nixon, sullied the presidency a group of GOP leaders put party loyalty aside and told Nixon that it was time to depart.
  • John Kenneth White, professor of politics at the Catholic University of America, If the two-party system is over, say goodbye to the GOP, The Hill, republished by MSN, 10 August 2023

• Donald Trump’s 2015 descent down the escalator to announce his candidacy was symbolic. It marked the fall of the party establishment and the beginning of a hostile takeover by a talented showman who excelled in the performance aspect of politics. A now-exiled member of the establishment, Liz Cheney, states, “What we’ve done in our politics is to create a situation where we’re electing idiots.”
  Republican presidential candidate Will Hurd recently told a gathering of Iowa Republicans: “Donald Trump is running for president in order for him to stay out of jail.” Hurd is right. A conviction on any of the charges levied against the former president could send him to prison for the rest of his life. Only the comforts of the White House, and a president armed with a pen who is willing to pardon Trump, can salvage what remains of his life.
  Meanwhile, any reports of the Democratic party’s demise are highly overrated. During the past two years, the centrist and progressive wings of the party have united behind President Biden. What opposition there is to a second Biden term centers on one issue: his age. Unlike the third-party candidacy of Strom Thurmond in 1948, who objected to Harry Truman’s civil rights policy, or the challenges by Eugene McCarthy and Robert F. Kennedy to Lyndon B. Johnson’s Vietnam War 20 years later, the policies pursued by the Biden-Harris administration are popular both within the party and without.
  • John Kenneth White, professor of politics at the Catholic University of America, If the two-party system is over, say goodbye to the GOP, The Hill, republished by MSN, 10 August 2023

• If things don’t change, the Republican Party is finished. Republicans are fighting against a political demography that is younger, more racially and culturally diverse and more highly educated. Between 2016 and 2024, there will be 32 million new voters while in the same period, there will be 20 million fewer older voters. Since 2008, young voters have awarded more than 60 percent of their ballots to Barack Obama and Joe Biden, and 55 percent to Hillary Clinton. Older voters have given majorities to GOP presidential candidates since 2004, including Donald Trump in 2020.
  Unless Republicans bid Donald Trump adieu, the Republican Party will find itself at odds with a younger generation of voters who will shape the politics of the 21st century. Without the ability to adapt, the Republican Party is in danger of fracturing like a shattered piece of glass.
  What will come after it is something we can hardly imagine. But it won’t be the two-party system as we know it.
  • John Kenneth White, professor of politics at the Catholic University of America, If the two-party system is over, say goodbye to the GOP, The Hill, republished by MSN, 10 August 2023

• My party, unfortunately, is the bastion of those people, not all of them, but most of them, who are still basing their decision on race. Let me just be candid: My party is full of racists. And the real reason a considerable portion of my party wants President Obama out of the White House has nothing to do with the content of his character, nothing to do with his competence as commander-in-chief and president, and everything to do with the color of his skin. And that's despicable.
  • Lawrence Wilkerson, interview on The Ed Show, as quoted in "Colin Powell’s former chief of staff: 'My party is full of racists'" (26 October 2012), MSNBC

• It has come to this. The GOP, formerly the party of Lincoln and ostensibly the party of liberty and limited government, is being defined by clamors for a mass roundup and deportation of millions of human beings. To will an end is to will the means for the end, so the Republican clamors are also for the requisite expansion of government's size and coercive powers.
  • George Will, "Trump Should Have No Place in the Party of Liberty and Limited Government" (22 August 2015), National Review

• Worse than the myth and the cliché is the outright lie, the utter fabrication with malice aforethought, and my nominee for the worst of them is the popular but indefensible belief that the two major U.S. political parties somehow 'switched places' vis-à-vis protecting the rights of black Americans, a development believed to be roughly concurrent with the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the rise of Richard Nixon. That Republicans have let Democrats get away with this mountebankery is a symptom of their political fecklessness, and in letting them get away with it the GOP has allowed itself to be cut off rhetorically from a pantheon of Republican political heroes, from Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass to Susan B. Anthony, who represent an expression of conservative ideals as true and relevant today as it was in the 19th century. Perhaps even worse, the Democrats have been allowed to rhetorically bury their Bull Connors, their longstanding affiliation with the Ku Klux Klan, and their pitiless opposition to practically every major piece of civil-rights legislation for a century. Republicans may not be able to make significant inroads among black voters in the coming elections, but they would do well to demolish this myth nonetheless.
  • Kevin Williamson, "The Party of Civil Rights" (28 May 2012), The National Review

• Southerners who defected from the Democratic Party in the 1960s and thereafter did so to join a Republican Party that was far more enlightened on racial issues than were the Democrats of the era, and had been for a century. There is no radical break in the Republicans' civil rights history. From abolition to Reconstruction to the anti-lynching laws, from the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the Civil Rights Act of 1875 to the Civil Rights Acts of 1957, 1960, and 1964, there exists a line that is by no means perfectly straight or unwavering but that nonetheless connects the politics of Lincoln with those of Dwight D. Eisenhower. And from slavery and secession to remorseless opposition to everything from Reconstruction to the anti-lynching laws, the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, the Civil Rights Act of 1875, and the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960, there exists a similarly identifiable line connecting John Calhoun and Lyndon Baines Johnson. Supporting civil-rights reform was not a radical turnaround for congressional Republicans in 1964, but it was a radical turnaround for Johnson and the Democrats.
  • Kevin Williamson, "The Party of Civil Rights" (28 May 2012), The National Review

• The Republican platform in 1964 was hardly catnip for Klansmen. It spoke of the Johnson administration's failure to help further the 'just aspirations of the minority groups' and blasted the president for his refusal 'to apply Republican-initiated retraining programs where most needed, particularly where they could afford new economic opportunities to Negro citizens'. Other planks in the platform included, 'improvements of civil rights statutes adequate to changing needs of our times; such additional administrative or legislative actions as may be required to end the denial, for whatever unlawful reason, of the right to vote; continued opposition to discrimination based on race, creed, national origin or sex'. And Goldwater's fellow Republicans ran on a 1964 platform demanding 'full implementation and faithful execution of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and all other civil rights statutes, to assure equal rights and opportunities guaranteed by the Constitution to every citizen'. Some dog whistle.
  • Kevin Williamson, "The Party of Civil Rights" (28 May 2012), The National Review

• The legislative record, the evolution of the electorate, the party platforms, the keynote speeches, none of them suggests a party-wide Republican about-face on civil rights. Neither does the history of the black vote. While Republican affiliation was beginning to grow in the south in the late 1930s, the GOP also lost its lock on black voters in the north, among whom the New Deal was extraordinarily popular. By 1940, Democrats for the first time won a majority of black votes in the north. This development was not lost on Lyndon Johnson, who crafted his Great Society with the goal of exploiting widespread dependency for the benefit of the Democratic Party.
  • Kevin Williamson, "The Party of Civil Rights" (28 May 2012), The National Review

• In many cases segregationist Democrats were thrown out by southern voters in favor of civil-rights Republicans. One of the loudest Democratic segregationists in the House was Texas' John Dowdy... It was in fact not until 1995 that Republicans represented a majority of the southern congressional delegation, and they had hardly spent the Reagan years campaigning on the resurrection of Jim Crow. It was not the Civil War but the Cold War that shaped mid-century partisan politics. Eisenhower warned the country against the 'military-industrial complex', but in truth Ike's ascent had represented the decisive victory of the interventionist, hawkish wing of the Republican Party.
  • Kevin Williamson, "The Party of Civil Rights" (28 May 2012), The National Review

• The Republican party had long been staunchly anti-Communist, but the post-war era saw that anti-Communism energized and looking for monsters to slay, both abroad — in the form of the Soviet Union and its satellites, and at home, in the form of the growing welfare state, the 'creeping socialism' conservatives dreaded. By the middle 1960s, the semi-revolutionary left was the liveliest current in U.S. politics, and Republicans' unapologetic anti-Communism, especially conservatives' rhetoric connecting international socialism abroad with the welfare state at home — left the Left with nowhere to go but the Democratic party. Vietnam was Johnson’s war, but by 1968 the Democratic party was not his alone.
  • Kevin Williamson, "The Party of Civil Rights" (28 May 2012), The National Review

• Republican ascendancy in Dixie is associated with the rise of the southern middle class, the increasingly trenchant conservative critique of communism and the welfare state, the Vietnam controversy and the rise of the counter-culture, law-and-order concerns rooted in the urban chaos that ran rampant from the late 1960s to the late 1980s, and the incorporation of the radical left into the Democratic Party. Individual events, especially the freak show that was the 1968 Democratic convention, helped solidify conservatives' affiliation with the Republican party. Democrats might argue that some of these concerns, especially welfare and crime, are 'dog whistles' or 'code' for race and racism, but this criticism is shallow in light of the evidence and the real saliency of those issues among U.S. voters of all backgrounds and both parties for decades. Indeed, Democrats who argue that the best policies for black Americans are those that are soft on crime and generous with welfare are engaged in much the same sort of cynical racial calculation President Johnson was practicing when he informed skeptical southern governors that his plan for the Great Society was 'to have them niggers voting Democratic for the next two hundred years'. Johnson's crude racism is, happily, largely a relic of the past, but his strategy endures.
  • Kevin Williamson, "The Party of Civil Rights" (28 May 2012), The National Review

• I would not speak with disrespect of the Republican Party. I always speak with great respect of the past.
  • Woodrow Wilson, as quoted in Selected Addresses and Public Papers of Woodrow Wilson, Albert Bushnell Hart, ed. (1918), p. 62

• The 2009 version of the Republican Party has no boundaries, has no shame and has proved that they will put politics above patriotism at every turn.
  • Brad Woodhouse, the communications director of the Democratic National Committee, as quoted in "Weekend Opinionator: Does the Nobel Hate America?", by Tobin Harshaw in The New York Times (9 October 2009)

• How did the party of Lincoln allow itself to be taken over by the claque of crazies who now define it? How is it that a black person who in many respects is attracted to Republican ideology finds himself revulsed by the party, which seems to have fallen under the control of people who just can't for the life of them make peace with the outcome of the Civil War?
  • Don Wycliff, "Today's GOP a political bedlam", The Chicago Tribune (27 September 2009), Illinois

Z

• Republicans stand for raw, unbridled evil and greed and ignorance smothered in balloons and ribbons.
  • Frank Zappa, interviewed in Spin, June 1991 (transcribed at OOcities)

Quotes from party platforms

• With our republican fathers, we hold it to be a self-evident truth, that all men are endowed with the inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and that the primary object and ulterior design of our federal government were to secure these rights to all persons under its exclusive jurisdiction... As our republican fathers, when they had abolished slavery in all our national territory, ordained that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law, it becomes our duty to maintain this provision of the constitution against all attempts to violate it for the purpose of establishing slavery in the territories of the United States by positive legislation, prohibiting its existence or extension therein... We deny the authority of congress, of a territorial Legislation, of any individual, or association of individuals, to give legal existence to slavery in any territory of the United States, while the present constitution shall be maintained.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1856 (17 May 1856).

• [T]he normal condition of all the territory of the United States is that of freedom. That, as our Republican fathers, when they had abolished slavery in all our national territory, ordained that 'no persons should be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law', it becomes our duty, by legislation, whenever such legislation is necessary, to maintain this provision of the Constitution against all attempts to violate it; and we deny the authority of Congress, of a territorial legislature, or of any individuals, to give legal existence to slavery in any territory of the United States.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1860 (17 May 1860)

• [W]e brand the recent reopening of the African slave trade, under the cover of our national flag, aided by perversions of judicial power, as a crime against humanity and a burning shame to our country and age; and we call upon Congress to take prompt and efficient measures for the total and final suppression of that execrable traffic... The Republican Party is opposed to any change in our naturalization laws or any state legislation by which the rights of citizens hitherto accorded to immigrants from foreign lands shall be abridged or impaired.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1860 (17 May 1860)

• [T]he Republican party is opposed to any change in our naturalization laws or any state legislation by which the rights of citizens hitherto accorded to immigrants from foreign lands shall be abridged or impaired; and in favor of giving a full and efficient protection to the rights of all classes of citizens, whether native or naturalized, both at home and abroad.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1860 (17 May 1860)

• It is the highest duty of every American citizen to maintain against all their enemies the integrity of the Union and the paramount authority of the constitution and laws of the United States; and that, laying aside all differences of political opinion, we pledge ourselves, as Union men, animated by a common sentiment and aiming at a common object, to do everything in our power to aid the Government in quelling by force of arms the Rebellion now raging against its authority, and in bringing to the punishment due to their crimes the rebels and traitors arrayed against it... We approve the determination of the government of the United States not to compromise with rebels, or to offer them any terms of peace, except such as may be based upon an unconditional surrender of their hostility and a return to their just allegiance to the constitution and laws of the United States, and that we call upon the government to maintain this position and to prosecute the war with the utmost possible vigor to the complete suppression of the Rebellion, in full reliance upon the self-sacrificing patriotism, the heroic valor and the undying devotion of the American people to the country and its free institutions.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1864 (7 June 1864)

• As slavery was the cause, and now constitutes the strength of this rebellion, and as it must be, always and everywhere, hostile to the principles of republican government, justice and the national safety demand its utter and complete extirpation from the soil of the republic; and that, while we uphold and maintain the acts and proclamations by which the government, in its own defense, has aimed a deathblow at this gigantic evil, we are in favor, furthermore, of such an amendment to the constitution, to be made by the people in conformity with its provisions, as shall terminate and forever prohibit the existence of slavery within the limits of the jurisdiction of the United States.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1864 (7 June 1864).

• [W]e approve and applaud the practical wisdom, the unselfish patriotism and the unswerving fidelity to the constitution and the principles of American liberty, with which Abraham Lincoln has discharged, under circumstances of unparalleled difficulty, the great duties and responsibilities of the presidential office; that we approve and endorse, as demanded by the emergency and essential to the preservation of the nation and as within the provisions of the constitution, the measures and acts which he has adopted to defend the nation against its open and secret foes; that we approve, especially, the Proclamation of Emancipation, and the employment as Union soldiers of men heretofore held in slavery; and that we have full confidence in his determination to carry these and all other constitutional measures essential to the salvation of the country into full and complete effect.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1864 (7 June 1864).

• The government owes to all men employed in its armies, without regard to distinction of color, the full protection of the laws of war, and that any violation of these laws, or of the usages of civilized nations in time of war, by the rebels now in arms, should be made the subject of prompt and full redress... Immigration, which in the past has added so much to the wealth, development of resources and increase of power to the nation, the asylum of the oppressed of all nations, should be fostered and encouraged by a liberal and just policy... The people of the United States can never regard with indifference the attempt of any European power to overthrow by force or to supplant by fraud the institutions of any republican government on the western continent and that they will view with extreme jealousy, as menacing to the peace and independence of their own country, the efforts of any such power to obtain new footholds for monarchical government, sustained by foreign military force, in near proximity to the United States.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1864 (7 June 1864).

• We maintain that man was not born to be ruled, but that he consented to be governed, and that the reasons that moved him thereto are few and simple. He has voluntarily submitted to government because, only by the establishment of just laws, and the power to enforce those laws, can an orderly life be maintained, full and equal opportunity for all be established, and the blessings of liberty be perpetuated. We hold that government, and those entrusted with government, should set a high example of honesty, of justice, and unselfish devotion to the public good; that they should labor to maintain tranquility at home and peace and friendship with all the nations of the earth... We condemn bigots who inject class, racial and religious prejudice into public and political matters. Bigotry is un-American and a danger to the republic. We deplore the duplicity and insincerity of the party in power in racial and religious matters. Although they have been in office as a 'Majority Party' for many years, they have not kept nor do they intend to keep their promises. The Republican Party will not mislead, exploit or attempt to confuse minority groups for political purposes. All American citizens are entitled to full, impartial enforcement of Federal laws relating to their civil rights.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1952 (7 July 1952).

• We believe that the federal government should take supplemental action within its constitutional jurisdiction to oppose discrimination against race, religion or national origin... We will prove our good faith by appointing qualified persons, without distinction of race, religion or national origin, to responsible positions in the government... We will prove our good faith by federal action toward the elimination of lynching. Federal action toward the elimination of poll taxes as a prerequisite to voting... We will prove our good faith by appropriate action to end segregation in the District of Columbia... We will prove our good faith by enacting Federal legislation to further just and equitable treatment in the area of discriminatory employment practices... We recommend to Congress the submission of a Constitutional Amendment providing equal rights for men and women; we favor legislation assuring equal pay for equal work regardless of sex... We favor eventual statehood for Puerto Rico... Upon this statement of truths and this pledge of performance, the Republican Party stands confident that it expresses the hopes of the citizens of America and certain that it points out with integrity a road upon which free men may march into a new day—a new and better day, in which shall be fulfilled the decent aspirations of our people for peace, for solvency and for the fulfillment of our best welfare, under the guidance of divine providence.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1952 (7 July 1952).

• We shall ever build anew, that our children and their children, without distinction because of race, creed or color, may know the blessings of our free land... Fight for the elimination of discrimination in employment because of race, creed, color, national origin, ancestry or sex... We recommend to Congress the submission of a constitutional amendment providing equal rights for men and women... The Republican Party points to an impressive record of accomplishment in the field of civil rights and commits itself anew to advancing the rights of all our people regardless of race, creed, color or national origin... The many Negroes who have been appointed to high public positions have played a significant part in the progress... The Republican Party has unequivocally recognized that the supreme law of the land is embodied in the Constitution, which guarantees to all people the blessings of liberty, due process and equal protection of the laws. It confers upon all native-born and naturalized citizens not only citizenship in the State where the individual resides but citizenship of the United States as well. This is an unqualified right, regardless of race, creed or color... We believe that true progress can be attained through intelligent study, understanding, education and good will. Use of force or violence by any group or agency will tend only to worsen the many problems inherent in the situation. This progress must be encouraged and the work of the courts supported in every legal manner by all branches of the federal government to the end that the constitutional ideal of the law, regardless of race, creed or color, be steadily achieved.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1956 (20 August 1956).

• The Republican Party supports an immigration policy which is in keeping with the traditions of America in providing a haven for oppressed peoples, and which is based on equality of treatment, freedom from implications of discrimination between racial, nationality and religious groups, and flexible enough to conform to changing needs and conditions... We approve appropriate action to oppose the imposition by foreign governments of discrimination against United States citizens, based on their religion or race.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1956 (20 August 1956).

• Segregation in the active Armed Forces of the United States has been ended. For the first time in our history there is no segregation in veterans' hospitals and among civilians on naval bases. This is an impressive record. We pledge ourselves to continued progress in this field. The Republican Party has unequivocally recognized that the supreme law of the land is embodied in the constitution, which guarantees to all people the blessings of liberty, due process and equal protection of the laws. It confers upon all native-born and naturalized citizens not only citizenship in the state where the individual resides but citizenship of the United States as well. This is an unqualified right, regardless of race, creed, or color. The Republican Party accepts the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court that racial discrimination in publicly supported schools must be progressively eliminated. We concur in the conclusion of the Supreme Court that its decision directing school desegregation should be accomplished with "all deliberate speed" locally through Federal District Courts. The implementation order of the Supreme Court recognizes the complex and acutely emotional problems created by its decision in certain sections of our country where racial patterns have been developed in accordance with prior and long-standing decisions of the same tribunal. We believe that true progress can be attained through intelligent study, understanding, education and good will. Use of force or violence by any group or agency will tend only to worsen the many problems inherent in the situation. This progress must be encouraged and the work of the courts supported in every legal manner by all branches of the federal government to the end that the constitutional ideal of the law, regardless of race, creed or color, be steadily achieved.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1956 (20 August 1956).

• Free men look to us for leadership and support, which we dedicate ourselves to give out of the abundance of our national strength... This nation was created to give expression, validity and purpose to our spiritual heritage, the supreme worth of the individual. In such a nation, a nation dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal, racial discrimination has no place. It can hardly be reconciled with a constitution that guarantees equal protection under law to all persons. In a deeper sense, too, it is immoral and unjust. As to those matters within reach of political action and leadership, we pledge ourselves unreservedly to its eradication... Equality under law promises more than the equal right to vote and transcends mere relief from discrimination by government. It becomes a reality only when all persons have equal opportunity, without distinction of race, religion, color or national origin, to acquire the essentials of life—housing, education and employment. The Republican Party—the party of Abraham Lincoln—from its very beginning has striven to make this promise a reality. It is today, as it was then, unequivocally dedicated to making the greatest amount of progress toward the objective.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1960 (25 July 1960).

• To Republicans, liberty is still today man's most precious possession. For every citizen, and for the generations to come, we Republicans vow that it shall be preserved... We pledge continued opposition to discrimination based on race, creed, national origin, or sex. We recognize that the elimination of any such discrimination is a matter of heart, conscience, and education, as well as of equal rights under law... We pledge to help assure equal opportunity and a good education for all... It is a high mission of government to help assure equal opportunity for all, affording every citizen an equal chance at the starting line but never determining who is to win or lose. But government must also reflect the nation's compassionate concern for those who are unable, through no fault of their own, to provide adequately for themselves... We pledge to continue the advancement of education on all levels, through such programs as selective aid to higher education, strengthened State and local tax resources, including tax credits for college education, while resisting the Democratic efforts which endanger local control of schools... We pledge to open avenues of peaceful progress in solving racial controversies while discouraging lawlessness and violence... We pledge full implementation and faithful execution of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and all other civil rights statutes, to assure equal rights and opportunities guaranteed by the Constitution to every citizen.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1964 (13 July 1964).

• Twice before, our party gave the people of America leadership at a time of crisis, leadership which won us peace in place of war, unity in place of discord, compassion in place of bitterness. A century ago, Abraham Lincoln` gave that leadership. From it came one nation, consecrated to liberty and justice for all. Fifteen years ago, Dwight D. Eisenhower gave that leadership. It brought the end of a war, eight years of peace, enhanced respect in the world, orderly progress at home, and trust of our people in their leaders and in themselves... We must reaffirm our commitment to Lincoln's challenge of 106 years ago... Americans critically need—and are eager for; new and dynamic leadership. We offer that leadership; a leadership to eradicate bitterness and discrimination... We pledge energetic, positive leadership to enforce statutory and constitutional protections to eliminate discrimination... We pledge concern for the unique problems of citizens long disadvantaged in our total society by race, color, national origin, creed, or sex.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1968 (5 August 1968).

• The plight of American Indians and Eskimos is a national disgrace. Contradictory government policies have led to intolerable deprivation for these citizens. We dedicate ourselves to the promotion of policies responsive to their needs and desires and will seek the full participation of these people and their leaders in the formulation of such policies. Inequality of jobs, of education, of housing and of health blight their lives today. We believe the Indian and Eskimo must have an equal opportunity to participate fully in American society. Moreover, the uniqueness and beauty of these native cultures must be recognized and allowed to flourish... The principles of the 1965 Immigration Act, non-discrimination against national origins, reunification of families, and selective support for the American labor market, have our unreserved backing, We will refine this new law to make our immigration policy still more equitable and non-discriminatory.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1968 (5 August 1968).

• Our party historically has been the party of freedom. We are the only barricade against those who, through excessive government power, would overwhelm and destroy man's liberty. If liberty fails, all else is dross. Beyond freedom we emphasize trust and credibility. We have pledged only what we honestly believe we can perform. In a world where broken promises become a way of life, we submit that a nation progresses not on promises broken but on pledges kept. We have also accented the moral nature of the crisis which confronts us. At the core of that crisis is the life, the liberty, and the happiness of man. If life can be taken with impunity, if liberty is subtly leeched away, if the pursuit of happiness becomes empty and futile, then indeed are the moral foundations in danger. We have placed high store on our basic theme. The dogmas of the quiet past simply will not do for the restless present. The case is new. We must most urgently think anew and act anew. This is an era of rapid, indeed violent change. Clearly we must dis-enthrall ourselves. Only then can we save this great republic. We rededicate ourselves to this republic; this one nation.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1968 (5 August 1968).

• We stand for an equitable, non-discriminatory immigration policy, reaffirming our support of the principles of the 1965 Immigration Act. Non-discrimination against national origins, reunification of families, and the selective admission of the specially talented. The immigration process must be just... Strides have been made toward wiping out the last vestiges of racial discrimination. We regard these tasks as never completed, but we are well on the way and pledge ourselves to press forward assuring all men and women in the armed forces rewarding careers... Our ties with Africa are rooted in the heritage of many Americans and in our historic commitment to self-determination. We respect the hard-earned sovereignty of Africa's new states and will continue to do our utmost to make a meaningful contribution to their development. We have no illusions that the United States can single-handedly solve the seemingly intractable problems of apartheid and minority rule, but we can and will encourage non-violent, evolutionary change by supporting international efforts peacefully to resolve the problems of southern Africa and by maintaining our contacts with all.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1972 (21 August 1972).

• Business, so vital to our economic system, is free enterprise in its purest sense. It holds forth opportunity to the individual, regardless of race or color, to fulfill the American dream. The seedbed of innovation and invention, it is the starting point of many of the country's large businesses, and today its roll in our increasingly technological economy is crucial. We pledge to sustain and expand that role... We have requested Congress to expand the jurisdiction of the Commission on Civil Rights to cover sex discrimination, recommended and supported passage of Title IX of the Higher Education Act opposing discrimination against women in educational institutions, supported the Equal Employment Opportunity Act of 1972 giving the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission enforcement power in sex discrimination cases... Other factors beyond outright employer discrimination, the lack of child care facilities, for example, can limit job opportunities for women.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1972 (21 August 1972).

• We will work toward ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment, appointment of women to highest level positions in the Federal Government, including the Cabinet and Supreme Court, equal pay for equal work, elimination of discrimination against women at all levels in the federal government, elimination of discrimination against women in the criminal justice system, in sentencing, rehabilitation and prison facilities, increased opportunities for the part time employment of women, and expanded training programs for women who want to reenter the labor force, elimination of economic discrimination against women in credit, mortgage, insurance, property, rental and finance contracts. We pledge vigorous enforcement of all Federal statutes and executive orders barring job discrimination on the basis of sex.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1972 (21 August 1972).

• We deplore what is tantamount to cruel discrimination. Age discrimination in employment, and the discrimination of neglect and indifference, perhaps the cruelest of all... From its beginning, our party has led the way for equal rights and equal opportunity... Through our efforts, de jure segregation is virtually ended. We pledge continuation of these efforts until no American schoolchild suffers educational deprivation because of the color of his skin or the language he speaks and all school children are receiving high quality education... Build facilities for disadvantaged children. Further to assure minority progress, we have provided more support to predominantly black colleges than ever before... We will press on with our fight against social injustice and discrimination, building upon the achievements already made. Knowing that none of us can reap the fullest blessings of liberty until all of us can, we reaffirm our commitment to the upward struggle for universal freedom led by Abraham Lincoln a century ago.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1972 (21 August 1972).

• Our children deserve quality education. We believe that segregated schools are morally wrong and unconstitutional... Our approach is to work to eradicate the root causes of segregated schools, such as housing discrimination and gerrymandered school districts. We must get on with the education of all our children.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1976 (18 August 1976), Kansas City, Missouri.

• Roadblocks must be removed that may prevent Americans from realizing their full potential in society. Unfair discrimination is a burden that intolerably weighs morally, economically and politically upon a free nation. While working to eradicate discriminatory practices, every citizen should be encouraged to take pride in and foster the cultural heritage that has been passed on from previous generations. Almost every American traces ancestry from another country; this cultural diversity gives strength to our national heritage. There must be vigorous enforcement of laws to assure equal treatment in job recruitment, hiring, promotion, pay, credit, mortgage access and housing. The way to end discrimination, however, is not by resurrecting the much discredited quota system and attempting to cloak it in an aura of new respectability. Rather, we must provide alternative means of assisting the victims of past discrimination to realize their full worth as American citizens. Wiping out past discrimination requires continued emphasis on providing educational opportunities for minority citizens, increasing direct and guaranteed loans to minority business enterprises, and affording qualified minority persons equal opportunities for government positions at all levels.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1976 (18 August 1976), Kansas City, Missouri.

• Women, who comprise a numerical majority of the population, have been denied a just portion of our nation's rights and opportunities. We reaffirm our pledge to work to eliminate discrimination in all areas for reasons of race, color, national origin, age, creed or sex and to enforce vigorously laws guaranteeing women equal rights. The Republican Party reaffirms its support for ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment. Our party was the first national party to endorse the ERA in 1940. We continue to believe its ratification is essential to insure equal rights for all Americans... When language is a cause of discrimination, there must be an intensive educational effort to enable Spanish-speaking students to become fully proficient in English, while maintaining their own language and cultural heritage... Handicapped persons must be admitted into the mainstream of our society. Too often the handicapped population of the nation—over 30 million men, women and children—has been denied the rights taken for granted by other citizens. Time after time, the paths are closed to the handicapped in education, employment, transportation, health care, housing, recreation, insurance, polling booths and due process of law. National involvement is necessary to correct discrimination in these areas.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1976 (18 August 1976), Kansas City, Missouri.

• We oppose discrimination in housing, whether by individuals or by institutional financing polices... The criminal justice system must be more vigilant in preventing rape, eliminating discrimination against the victim, and dealing with the offenders... Among the rights that are the entitlement of every American worker is the right to join a union, large, small, or independent, the right to be protected against racial discrimination.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1976 (18 August 1976), Kansas City, Missouri.

• The United States has always supported the process of self-determination in Africa. Our friendship for the African countries is expressed in support for continued peaceful economic development, expansion of trade, humanitarian relief efforts and our belief that the entire continent should be free from outside military intervention. Millions of Americans recognize their historical and cultural ties with Africa and express their desire that United States policy toward Africa is a matter of great importance. We support all forces which promote negotiated settlements and racial peace. We shall continue to deplore all violence and terrorism and to urge all concerned that the rights of tribal, ethnic, and racial minorities be guaranteed through workable safeguards. Our policy is to strengthen the forces of moderation recognizing that solutions to African problems will not come quickly. The peoples of Africa can coexist in security, work together in freedom and harmony, and strive together to secure their prosperity. We hope that the Organization of African Unity will be able to achieve mature and stable relationships within Africa and abroad. The interests of peace and security in Africa are best served by the absence of arms and greater concentration on peaceful development. We reserve the right to maintain the balance by extending our support to nations facing a threat.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1976 (18 August 1976), Kansas City, Missouri.

• Arts and humanities offer an opportunity for every American to become a participant in activities that add fullness, expression, challenge and joy to our daily lives. We Republicans consider the preservation of the rich cultural heritages of our various ethnic groups as a priority goal.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1976 (18 August 1976), Kansas City, Missouri.

• It has long been a fundamental conviction of the Republican Party that government should foster in our society a climate of maximum individual liberty and freedom of choice. Properly informed, our people as individuals or acting through instruments of popular consultation can make the right decisions affecting personal or general welfare, free of pervasive and heavy-handed intrusion by the central government into the decision-making process. This tenet is the genius of representative democracy. Republicans also treasure the ethnic, cultural, and regional diversity of our people. This diversity fosters a dynamism in American society that is the envy of the world... As the 'Party of Lincoln', we remain equally and steadfastly committed to the equality of rights for all citizens, regardless of race. Although this nation has not yet eliminated all vestiges of racism over the years we are heartened by the progress that has been made, we are proud of the role that our party has played, and we are dedicated to standing shoulder to shoulder with black Americans in that cause.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1980 (15 July 1980), Detroit, Michigan.

• Through long association with government programs, the word 'welfare' has come to be perceived almost exclusively as tax-supported aid to the needy. But in its most inclusive sense—and as Americans understood it from the beginning of the Republic—such aid also encompasses those charitable works performed by private citizens, families, and social, ethnic, and religious organizations. Policies of the federal government leading to high taxes, rising inflation, and bureaucratic empire-building have made it difficult and often impossible for such individuals and groups to exercise their charitable instincts. We believe that government policies that fight inflation, reduce tax rates, and end bureaucratic excesses can help make private effort by the American people once again a major force in those works of charity which are the true signs of a progressive and humane society
  • Republican Party Platform of 1980 (15 July 1980), Detroit, Michigan.

• No individual should be victimized by unfair discrimination because of race, sex, advanced age, physical handicap, difference of national origin or religion, or economic circumstance... Republicans deplore growing antisemitism... The Republican Party supports the principle and process of self-determination in Africa. We reaffirm our commitment to this principle... We recognize that much is at stake in Africa and that the United States and the industrial west have vital interests there, economically, strategically, and politically. Working closely with our allies, a Republican administration will seek to assist the countries of Africa with our presence, our markets, our know-how, and our investment. We will work to create a climate of economic and political development and confidence. We will encourage and assist business to play a major role in support of regional industrial development programs, mineral complexes, and agricultural self-sufficiency. Republicans believe that African nations, if given a choice, will reject the Marxist, totalitarian model being forcibly imposed.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1980 (15 July 1980), Detroit, Michigan.

• The African peoples are convinced that the west is central to world stability and economic growth on which their own fortunes ultimately depend. A Republican administration will adhere to policies that reflect the complex origins of African conflicts, demonstrate that we know what U.S. interests are, and back those interests in meaningful ways. We will recognize the important role of economic and military assistance programs and will devote major resources to assisting African development and stability when such aid is given on a bilateral basis and contributes directly to American interests on the continent. In southern Africa, American policies must be guided by common sense and by our own humanitarian principles. Republicans believe that our history has meaning for Africa in demonstrating that a multi-racial society with guarantees of individual rights is possible and can work. We must remain open and helpful to all parties, whether in the new Zimbabwe, in Namibia, or in the Republic of South Africa. A Republican administration will not endorse situations or constitutions, in whatever society, which are racist in purpose or in effect. It will not expect miracles, but will press for genuine progress in achieving goals consistent with American ideals.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1980 (15 July 1980), Detroit, Michigan.

• The Republican Party reaffirms its support of the pluralism and freedom that have been part and parcel of this great country. In so doing, it repudiates and completely disassociates itself from people, organizations, publications, and entities which promulgate the practice of any form of bigotry, racism, antisemitism, or religious intolerance... Americans demand a civil rights policy premised on the letter of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. That law requires equal rights; and it is our policy to end discrimination on account of sex, race, color, creed, or national origin. We have vigorously enforced civil rights statutes. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has recovered record amounts of back pay and other compensation for victims of employment discrimination. Just as we must guarantee opportunity, we oppose attempts to dictate results. We will resist efforts to replace equal rights with discriminatory quota systems and preferential treatment. Quotas are the most insidious form of discrimination: reverse discrimination against the innocent. We must always remember that, in a free society, different individual goals will yield different results. The Republican Party has an historic commitment to equal rights for women. Republicans pioneered the right of women to vote, and our party was the first major party to advocate equal pay for equal work, regardless of sex.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1984 (20 August 1984), Republican National Convention Committee on Resolutions.

• We will continue to actively seek the elimination of discrimination against homemakers with regard to Individual Retirement Accounts so that single-income couples can invest the same amount in IRAs as two-income couples... We deplore discrimination because of handicap... We are committed to enforcing statutory prohibitions barring discrimination against any otherwise qualified handicapped individuals, in any program receiving federal financial assistance, solely by reason of their handicap... Our history is a story about immigrants. We are proud that America still symbolizes hope and promise to the world. We have shown unparalleled generosity to the persecuted and to those seeking a better life. In return, they have helped to make a great land greater still.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1984 (20 August 1984), Republican National Convention Committee on Resolutions.

• We are committed to democracy in Africa and to the economic development that will help it flourish. That is why we will foster free-market, growth-oriented, and liberalized trading policies. As part of reforming the policies of the International Development Association, we have assisted in directing a larger proportion of its resources to sub-Saharan Africa. To nurture the spirit of individual initiative in Africa, our newly created African Development Foundation will work with African entrepreneurs at the village level. In addition, through our rejection of the austerity programs of international organizations, we are bringing new hope to the people of Africa that they will join in the benefits of the growing, dynamic world economy. We will continue to provide necessary security and economic assistance to African nations with which we maintain good relations to help them develop the infrastructure of democratic capitalism so essential to economic growth and individual accomplishment. We will encourage our allies in Europe and east Asia to coordinate their assistance efforts so that the industrialized countries will be able to contribute effectively to the economic development of the continent. We believe that, if given the choice, the nations of Africa will reject the model of Marxist state-controlled economies in favor of the prosperity and quality of life that free economies and free people can achieve. We will continue to assist threatened African governments to protect themselves and will work with them to protect their continent from subversion and to safeguard their strategic minerals.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1984 (20 August 1984), Republican National Convention Committee on Resolutions.

• We reaffirm our commitment to the rights of all South Africans. Apartheid is repugnant. In South Africa, as elsewhere on the continent, we support well-conceived efforts to foster peace, prosperity, and stability... Since its inception, the Republican Party has stood for the worth of every person. On that ground, we support the pluralism and diversity that have been part of our country's greatness. Deep in our hearts, we do believe that bigotry has no place in American life. We denounce those persons, organizations, publications, and movements which practice or promote racism, antisemitism or religious intolerance.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1988 (16 August 1988), Republican National Convention.

• A free economy helps defeat discrimination by fostering opportunity for all. That's why real income for black families has risen fourteen percent since 1982. It's why members of minority groups have been gaining jobs in the Republican recovery twice as fast as everyone else. Upward mobility for all Americans has come back strong. We are the party of real social progress. Republicans welcome the millions of forward-looking Americans who want an 'opportunity society', not a welfare state. We believe our country's greatest resource is its people; all its people. Their ingenuity and imagination are needed to make the most of our common future... We will strongly enforce statutory prohibitions barring discrimination because of handicap in any program receiving federal financial assistance... We share a deep concern for peace and justice in Northern Ireland and condemn all violence and terrorism in that strife-torn land. We support the process of peace and reconciliation established by the Anglo-Irish Agreement, and we encourage new investment and economic reconstruction in Northern Ireland on the basis of strict equality of opportunity and non-discrimination in employment.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1988 (16 August 1988), Republican National Convention.

• Republicans are committed to providing assistance for refugees fleeing Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. Republicans strongly believe that the promise of asylum for these refugees must be met by adequate resources and vigorous administration of refugee programs. We will increase efforts to resettle Vietnamese refugees under the orderly departure program. We are particularly committed to assisting the resettlement of Amerasian children against whom brutal discrimination is practiced... The recent African drought and resulting famine were not just natural disasters. They were made worse by poorly conceived development projects which stripped lands of their productive capacity. Republicans recognize that protecting the natural resource base of developing nations is essential to protecting future economic opportunities and assuring stable societies. We are leading the fight worldwide to require sound environmental planning as part of foreign development programs. We believe that peace in southern Africa can best be achieved by the withdrawal of all foreign forces from Angola, complete independence and self-determination for the people of Namibia, a rapid process of internal reconciliation, and free and fair elections in both places.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1988 (16 August 1988), Republican National Convention.

• While obstacles remain, we are closer than ever to a comprehensive settlement of these interrelated conflicts. America's strong support for Angolan freedom-fighters has helped make this progress possible. We also oppose the maintenance of communist forces and influence in Mozambique. Republicans deplore the apartheid system of South Africa and consider it morally repugnant. All who value human liberty understand the evil of apartheid, and we will not rest until apartheid is eliminated from South Africa. That will remain our goal. Republicans call for an effective and coordinated policy that will promote equal rights and a peaceful transition to a truly representative constitutional form of government for all South Africans and the citizens of all nations throughout Africa. We deplore violence employed against innocent blacks and whites from whatever source. We believe firmly that one element in the evolution of black political progress must be black economic progress; actions designed to pressure the government of South Africa must not have the effect of adversely affecting the rising aspirations and achievements of black South African entrepreneurs and workers and their families. We should also encourage the development of strong democratic black political institutions to aid in the peaceful transition to majority rule. Republicans believe that it is wrong to punish innocent black South Africans for the policies of the apartheid government of South Africa.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1988 (16 August 1988), Republican National Convention.

• Abraham Lincoln, our first Republican president, expressed the philosophy that inspires Republicans to this day, 'The legitimate object of government is to do for a community of people whatever they need to have done, but cannot do at all, or cannot so well do, for themselves in their separate and individual capacities. But in all that people can individually do as well for themselves, government ought not to interfere'. We believe that most problems of human making are within the capacity of human ingenuity to solve. For good reason, millions of new Americans have flocked to our shores. America has always been an opportunity society. Republicans have always believed that economic prosperity comes from individual enterprise, not government programs. We have defended our core principles for 138 years; but never has this country, and the world, been so receptive to our message.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1992 (17 August 1992), Republican National Convention.

• The fall of the Berlin Wall symbolizes an epochal change in the way people live. More important, it liberates the way people think. We see with new clarity that centralized government bureaucracies created in this century are not the wave of the future. Never again will people trust planners and paper shufflers more than they trust themselves. We all watched as the statue of Soviet hangman Feliks Dzherzhinsky was toppled in front of Moscow's KGB headquarters by the very people his evil empire sought to enslave. Its sightless eyes symbolized the moral blindness of totalitarians around the world. They could never see the indomitable spirit of people determined to be free from government control—free to build a better future with their own heads, hands, and hearts. We Republicans saw clearly the dangers of collectivism: not only the military threat, but the deeper threat to the souls of people bound in dependence. Here at home, we warned against Big Government, because we knew concentrated decision-making, no matter how well-intentioned, was a danger to liberty and prosperity. Republicans stood at the rampart of freedom, defending the individual against the domineering state. While we did not always prevail, we always stood our ground, faithful to our principles and confident of history's ultimate verdict.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1992 (17 August 1992), Republican National Convention.

• The protection of individual rights is the foundation for opportunity and security. The Republican Party is unique in this regard. Since its inception, it has respected every person, even when that proposition was not universally popular. Today, as in the day of Lincoln, we insist that no American's rights are negotiable. That is why we declare that bigotry and prejudice have no place in American life. We denounce all who practice or promote racism, antisemitism, or religious intolerance... We urge peace and justice for Northern Ireland. We welcome the newly begun process of constitutional dialogue that holds so much promise. We encourage investment and reconstruction to create opportunity for all.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1992 (17 August 1992), Republican National Convention.

• The diversity of our nation is reflected in this platform. We ask for the support and participation of all who substantially share our agenda. In one way or another, every Republican is a dissenter. At the same time, we are not morally indifferent. In this, as in many things, Lincoln is our model. At a time of great crisis, he spoke both words of healing and words of conviction. We do likewise, not for the peace of a political party, but because we citizens are bound together in a great enterprise.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1996 (12 August 1996), Republican National Convention, San Diego, California.

• We are the party of individual Americans, whose rights we protect and defend as the foundation for opportunity and security for all. Today, as at our founding in the day of Lincoln, we insist no one's rights are negotiable. As we strive to forge a national consensus on the divisive issues of our time, we call on all Republicans and all Americans to reject the forces of hatred and bigotry. Accordingly, we denounce all who practice or promote racism, antisemitism, ethnic prejudice, and religious intolerance... Because we are all one America, we oppose discrimination. We believe in the equality of all people before the law and that individuals should be judged by their ability rather than their race.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1996 (12 August 1996), Republican National Convention, San Diego, California.

• We reaffirm the Republican Party's historic commitment to agricultural progress through research and education, starting with the system of land grant colleges established in 1862. For the new century, as in the days of Lincoln, farming must look ahead to innovation and constant improvement, especially biotechnology and precision farming techniques... The sole source of equal opportunity for all is equality before the law. Therefore, we oppose discrimination based on sex, race, age, creed, or national origin, and will vigorously enforce anti-discrimination statutes.
  • Republican Party Platform of 1996 (12 August 1996), Republican National Convention, San Diego, California.

• We meet at a remarkable time in the life of our country. Our powerful economy gives America a unique chance to confront persistent challenges. Our country, after an era of drift, must now set itself to important tasks and higher goals. The Republican Party has the vision and leadership to address these issues. Our platform is uplifting and visionary. It reflects the views of countless Americans all across this country who believe in prosperity with a purpose... Since the election of 1860, the Republican Party has had a special calling, to advance the founding principles of freedom and limited government and the dignity and worth of every individual... Equality of individuals before the law has always been a cornerstone of our party. We therefore oppose discrimination based on sex, race, age, religion, creed, disability, or national origin and will vigorously enforce anti-discrimination statutes. As we strive to forge a national consensus on the crucial issues of our time, we call on all Americans to reject the forces of hatred and bigotry. Accordingly, we denounce all who practice or promote racism, antisemitism, ethnic prejudice, and religious intolerance. Our country was founded in faith and upon the truth that self-government is rooted... Rule of law is not consistent with state-sponsored brutality. When the Russian government attacks civilians in Chechnya, killing innocents without discrimination or accountability, neglecting orphans and refugees, it can no longer expect aid from international lending institutions. Moscow needs to operate with civilized self-restraint.
  • Republican Party Platform of 2000 (31 July 2000), Republican National Convention, United States of America: Republican National Committee

• One hundred and fifty years ago, Americans who had gathered to protest the expansion of slavery gave birth to a political party that would save the Union. The Republican Party. In 1860, Abraham Lincoln of Illinois carried the Republican banner in the presidential election and was elected the party's first president. He became our nation's greatest leader, and one of our party's greatest heroes. Every day, we strive to fulfill Lincoln's vision, a country united and free, in which all people are guaranteed equal rights and the opportunity to pursue their dreams. His legacy goes beyond the borders of America. It can be seen in free governments all over the world. Lincoln's successors have been united by a common purpose, defending freedom at home and promoting it abroad. Today, the Republican Party gathers to renominate a man who carries on the best traditions of our party by carrying the banner of freedom.
  • Republican Party Platform of 2004 (30 August 2004), Republican National Convention, United States of America

• Our nation is a land of opportunity for all, and our communities must represent the ideal of equality and justice for every citizen. The Republican Party favors aggressive, proactive measures to ensure that no individual is discriminated against on the basis of race, national origin, gender, or other characteristics covered by our civil rights laws. We also favor recruitment and outreach policies that cast the widest possible net so that the best qualified individuals are encouraged to apply for jobs, contracts, and university admissions. We believe in the principle of affirmative access – taking steps to ensure that disadvantaged individuals of all colors and ethnic backgrounds have the opportunity to compete economically and that no child is left behind educationally.
  • Republican Party Platform of 2004 (30 August 2004), Republican National Convention, United States of America

• Because we are opposed to discrimination, we reject preferences, quotas, and set-asides based on skin color, ethnicity, or gender, which perpetuate divisions and can lead people to question the accomplishments of successful minorities and women... As the party of Lincoln, we stand for freedom. We stand for the freedom of families and individuals to have good schools, good health care, and affordable housing and services. We stand for the freedom that comes with a good paying job in a growing economy. We stand for the freedom and dignity of every human life..
  • Republican Party Platform of 2004 (30 August 2004), Republican National Convention, United States of America

• We uphold the right of individual Americans to own firearms, a right which antedated the constitution and was solemnly confirmed by the Second Amendment. We applaud the Supreme Court's decision in Heller affirming that right, and we assert the individual responsibility to safely use and store firearms. We call on the next president to appoint judges who will similarly respect the constitution. Gun ownership is responsible citizenship, enabling Americans to defend themselves, their property, and communities. We call for education in constitutional rights in schools, and we support the option of firearms training in federal programs serving senior citizens and women. We urge immediate action to review the automatic denial of gun ownership to returning members of the armed forces who have suffered trauma during service to their country. We condemn frivolous lawsuits against firearms manufacturers, which are transparent attempts to deprive citizens of their rights. We oppose federal licensing of law-abiding gun owners and national gun registration as violations of the Second Amendment. We recognize that gun control only affects and penalizes law-abiding citizens, and that such proposals are ineffective at reducing violent crime.
  • Republican Party Platform of 2008 (1 September 2008), Republican National Convention, United States of America

• Individual rights, and the responsibilities that go with them, are the foundation of a free society. From the time of Lincoln, equality of individuals has been a cornerstone of the Republican Party. Our commitment to equal opportunity extends from landmark school-choice legislation for the students of Washington, D.C. to historic appointments at the highest levels of government. We consider discrimination based on sex, race, age, religion, creed, disability, or national origin to be immoral, and we will strongly enforce anti-discrimination statutes. We ask all to join us in rejecting the forces of hatred and bigotry and in denouncing all who practice or promote racism, antisemitism, ethnic prejudice, or religious intolerance. As a matter of principle, Republicans oppose any attempts to create race-based governments within the United States, as well as any domestic governments not bound by the constitution or the Bill of Rights. Precisely because we oppose discrimination, we reject preferences, quotas, and set-asides, whether in education or in corporate boardrooms. The government should not make contracts on this basis, and neither should corporations.
  • Republican Party Platform of 2008 (1 September 2008), Republican National Convention, United States of America

• Free speech on college campuses is to be celebrated, but there should be no place in academia for antisemitism or racism of any kind... All Americans stand equal before the law. We embrace the principle that all Americans should be treated with respect and dignity. In the spirit of the constitution, we consider discrimination based on sex, race, age, religion, creed, disability, or national origin unacceptable and immoral. We will strongly enforce anti-discrimination statutes and ask all to join us in rejecting the forces of hatred and bigotry and in denouncing all who practice or promote racism, antisemitism, ethnic prejudice, or religious intolerance.
  • Republican Party Platform of 2012 (27 August 2012), Republican National Convention, United States of America

• We call for legislation to ban sex-selective abortions; gender discrimination in its most lethal form... The Republican Party includes Americans from every faith and tradition, and our policies and positions respect the right of every American to follow his or her beliefs and underscore our reverence for the religious freedom envisioned by the founding fathers of our nation and of our party. As a matter of principle, we oppose the creation of any new race-based governments within the United States... Today's education reform movement calls for accountability at every stage of schooling. It affirms higher expectations for all students and rejects the crippling bigotry of low expectations... Public authorities must regain control of their correctional institutions, for we cannot allow prisons to become ethnic or racial battlegrounds. Persons jailed for whatever cause should be protected against cruel or degrading treatment by other inmates.
  • Republican Party Platform of 2012 (27 August 2012), Republican National Convention, United States of America

• Our wounded warriors, whether still in service or discharged, deserve the best medical care our country can provide. The nature of the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan has resulted in an unprecedented incidence of traumatic brain injury, loss of limbs, and post-traumatic stress disorder which calls for a new commitment of resources and personnel for its treatment and care to promote recovery. We must make military and veterans' medicine the gold standard for mental health care, advances in prosthetics, and treatment of trauma and eye injuries. We must heed Abraham Lincoln's command 'to care for him who bore the battle'. To care, as well, for the families of those who have made the ultimate sacrifice, who must be assured of meaningful financial assistance, remains our solemn duty... As we approach the 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, issued by the first Republican President Abraham Lincoln, we are reminded to be vigilant against human bondage in whatever form it appears. We will use the full force of the law against those who engage in modern-day forms of slavery, including the commercial sexual exploitation of children and the forced labor of men, women, and children.
  • Republican Party Platform of 2012 (27 August 2012), Republican National Convention, United States of America

See also

• Conservatism
• U.S. Democratic Party
• Economic liberalism
• Republic
• Right-wing politics
• Slavery in the United States

External links

• Official website