A GOP History

From anti-slavery roots to the modern era, a look at the Republican Party over the years

The Republican Party was founded in 1854 as an anti-slavery party. Angry over the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which allowed new territories to choose slavery, organizers held the party's first organizational meeting in March of that year in Ripon, Wisconsin, historians say: Others in Jackson, Michigan, are credited with running the party's first electoral ticket the following July. New Hampshire Republicans also claim that the party was first founded in Exeter, New Hampshire, on October 12, 1853.

The slavery issue, along with the gradual demise of the Whig party and the failure of the Free Soil and Know-Nothing parties, ignited the rapid expansion of the Republican Party in many communities in the northern states. New York Tribune editor Horace Greeley gets credit for coining the name "Republican" for those he said "had united to restore the Union to its true mission of champion and promulgator of Liberty rather than propagandist of slavery."

In 1856, John Fremont -- a 43-year-old western explorer and national hero -- won the first GOP nomination with the slogan, "Free Soil, Free Men, Fremont." Although he did not win the general election, Fremont did win 11 states in a three-man race. In 1860, as the slavery issue was driving the nation apart, GOP candidate Abraham Lincoln won the presidency, garnering 40 percent of the vote in a four-way race.

Lincoln's leadership during the Civil War and his ensuing assassination ushered in a period of Republican dominance that lasted more than 70 years.

The Republican Party controlled the White House for 56 of the 72 years from 1860 to 1932; the Senate for 60 years; and the House for 50. The GOP dominated national politics everywhere outside of the South -- and Republican platforms reminded voters of which party was on the losing side of the Civil War. The 1876 platform accused the Democratic Party of being "the same in character and spirit as when it sympathized with treason."

For the remainder of the 19th century, the Republican presidential nominee was a Northerner or former Civil War military officer. Presidents Ulysses S. Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes, James Garfield, Benjamin Harrison and William McKinley all served during the war. (Garfield and McKinley would both fall victim to assassins' bullets while in office.) Republican congressional leaders also exercised a great deal of authority during this period.

The end of slavery and the continuing westward expansion and industrialization of the country also shaped the still young Republican Party's priorities. Platforms during the latter part of the 19th century contained planks calling for the protection of U.S. businesses through tariffs; a strong currency; low taxes; and increased international trade.

It was in this period that the elephant became the enduring symbol of the party. During the 1874 mid-term elections, Harper's Weekly cartoonist Thomas Nast crafted a cartoon in direct response to a New York Herald's charge that Grant was the new American Caesar, planning to grab a third term in office: Nast pictured a Republican stampeding elephant and the traditional Democratic jackass in a cartoon together as "a warning that the Republican vote was being spooked into abandoning the Republican Party."

The portrayal of the Republicans as a runaway pachyderm was immediately popular, and within years Nast was using it to represent the party in all its moods.

Progressive reform and economic collapse

With a new century at hand, a hero from a new war -- the Spanish-American War -- became president and dominated the politics of the nation.

Theodore Roosevelt, who, at 42, became the youngest man to ever hold the presidency, succeeded the assassinated President McKinley in 1901 and won a landslide election in his own right in 1904.

It was McKinley, while governor of Ohio in the early 1890's, who coined the term "Grand Old Party" in reference to the Republican Party. "This Grand Old Party we love," or "Our Grand Old Party" were phrases he often uttered to visitors and supporters.

The larger-than-life T.R. used the "bully pulpit" of his office to promote his progressive Republican platform. Roosevelt attacked monopolies, earning him the nickname "trust buster." He laid the Trans-Pacific cable, expanded the Army and Navy, propounded an assertive foreign policy, and pushed the nation toward conservation of our natural resources.

But Roosevelt's policies split the party. His differences with his successor, William Howard Taft, and some of the party's bosses led him to seek an unprecedented third term in 1912. He ultimately abandoned the GOP to form the Progressive Party, which split the Republicans and allowed the election of Democrat Woodrow Wilson.

Wilson's two-term presidency was succeeded by 12 years of pro-business GOP stewardship of the White House, a post-World War I "Return to Normalcy" led by presidents Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover -- an era that ended with the onset of the Great Depression in 1929.

As the party in power at the time, the GOP was blamed for the country's economic collapse and a slow response its citizens' plight. In 1932, Democrat Franklin Roosevelt ousted Hoover in a landslide.

The Democrats would lose only two presidential elections in the next 32 years. Hoover won 40 states in 1928, the year before the Depression began: By 1936, GOP nominee Alf Landon could only carry two states against FDR. Between 1932 and 1968, only one Republican candidate -- national hero Dwight Eisenhower -- was able to capture the White House, and Republicans controlled both chambers of Congress for only four years (1947-1949 and 1953-1955).

Vietnam, Watergate and Reagan

The turning point in modern presidential politics occurred in the mid-1960s. The Democratic coalition fractured over the Vietnam war, civil rights, Lyndon Johnson's "Great Society" spending and cultural and social upheavals within the country.

In 1964, when Congress passed the Civil Rights Act, the so-called "Solid South" began drifting into the Republican column. Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, Louisiana and South Carolina went for the GOP nominee, Arizona Sen. Barry Goldwater, in 1964. Goldwater led the Republicans with a new ideological style of conservatism that resembled traditional party platforms with one major exception: He opposed and campaigned against the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

GOP President Richard Nixon resigned in 1974.

Although he was defeated, claiming only 38.5 percent of the vote, Goldwater's supporters gave rise to what is now considered the conservative wing of the party. In 1968, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Arkansas went for American Independent Party candidate George Wallace, but the entire South voted for Richard Nixon in 1972. The last time the South was solidly Democratic was 1976, when southerner Jimmy Carter won the White House.

Talk of complete party realignment proved hasty, however. Though the Nixon won by a landslide in 1972 against a liberal Democrat, George McGovern, the GOP was unable to win control of either chamber of Congress and continued to lag at the state and local level. The Watergate scandal and Nixon's resignation also seemed to scuttle the GOP's "Silent Majority," and in 1976 the Democrats swept to complete control.

The presidential candidacy of former California Gov. Ronald Reagan in 1980 revived and strengthened the nation's move toward the Republican Party. Campaigning against the "malaise" and economic and international policy failures of President Jimmy Carter and the Democratic Party, Reagan articulated a robust and optimistic conservative philosophy.

He pledged to cut taxes, revive the national economy, build up the country's defenses, engage the Soviet Union and the world from a position of strength, and restore national pride. Reagan also decried a Democratic Party that had grown increasingly liberal and was on the wrong side of large parts of the public on many hot-button social issues, such as abortion and school prayer.

President Ronald Reagan, "The Great Communicator," was extremely popular and easily won a second term in 1984.

On November 4, 1980, Reagan easily won the presidency, carrying 44 states and winning with 51 percent of the vote in a three-way race. The GOP also took control of the U.S. Senate for the first time in 26 years, and scored impressive gains in the U.S. House. Millions of so-called "Reagan Democrats" and increasingly active Christian conservatives flocked to Reagan's banner and formed key parts of his coalition.

Though turbulent, the Reagan years proved successful for the GOP. "The Great Communicator" was rewarded with a landslide win 1984 re-election, winning 49 states with more popular and electoral votes than any other American presidential candidate. Despite the Iran-Contra scandal of his second term, Reagan would leave the White House more popular than when he arrived, with his last years in office marked by his efforts with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to end the Cold War.

Reagan's immense popularity did not fully transfer to his party, however. Republicans would lose control of the Senate in the 1986 midterm elections, though they picked up more governorships. In 1988, George Bush became the first sitting vice president since Martin Van Buren 152 years earlier to win the White House, holding together the potent "Reagan Coalition" while pledging to block any tax increases. But he was the first presidential candidate since John F. Kennedy to win the election while his party lost seats in the House.

President George Bush won acclaim for his leadership during the Persian Gulf War.

Bush won wide acclaim for his leadership during the 1991 Persian Gulf War, but he struggled domestically. He broke his campaign promise of "Read my lips -- No new taxes" in an effort to reduce the national budget deficit, costing him support among the party's conservatives. The nation suffered a recession, and the deficits that grew in the 1980s ballooned to record size.

The recession and a 1992 primary challenge from conservative television commentator Pat Buchanan sapped the incumbent's strength for the fall election. In November, public dissatisfaction with the status quo gave the Democrats the White House for the first time in 12 years.

"New Democrat" Bill Clinton and the strong third-party candidacy of billionaire H. Ross Perot held Bush to 37.5 percent of the vote and 18 states (down from 53 percent and 40 states four years earlier). While the Democrats regained the Oval Office and held Congress, the GOP picked up 10 seats in the House.

The rise of Christian conservatism

During this period, the party relied heavily on the so-called "religious right" -- mostly Protestant evangelical voters who have become increasingly active in politics since the 1970s.

For much of its history, the Republican party had been distinctly Protestant -- reflecting the country's large Protestant majority during the mid-19th century. In the early 20th century, many Protestants turned to a movement known as "fundamentalism" -- named for a series of theological tracts called "The Fundamentals."

Fundamentalist Protestants found common cause with the GOP's stern opposition to "Godless Communism" during the 1950s and 60s. Religious conservatives found another issue drawing them into the political arena when the Supreme Court outlawed organized prayer in public school classrooms in 1962.

Jerry Falwell's "Moral Majority" organization played a significant role in electing President Ronald Reagan.

A collection of "Christian right" groups strongly supported Barry Goldwater's 1964 presidential campaign, and the 1973 Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion further spurred Christian conservatives.

Television evangelist Jerry Falwell's "Moral Majority" organization played a distinct role in Reagan's successful 1980 presidential campaign. In Reagan's political agenda, religious conservatives found a sympathetic ear: Opposition to abortion and the Equal Rights Amendment, as well as support for school prayer became important parts of the GOP platforms during the 1980s.

Another televangelist, Pat Robertson, also played a major role in the rise of the "religious right." Robertson's background included both religion and politics, as he was the son of Virginia Sen. A. Willis Robertson and a descendant of presidents William Henry Harrison and Benjamin Harrison.

Relying on a grass-roots organization built from viewers of his cable television Christian Broadcasting Network, Robertson made an unsuccessful run for the 1988 Republican presidential nomination. Robertson returned to broadcasting, but in 1989 formed the Christian Coalition to carry on the political fight for the Christian conservatives' social agenda.

Thanks in large part to its ability to mobilize voters and get out information, Christian conservatives claimed a share of the credit for the Republicans' 1994 midterm victories that gave them control of Congress for the first time in four decades. The Christian Coalition is also credited for aiding Texas Gov. George W. Bush, this year's standard-bearer and the former president's son, in some key primary states -- most notably South Carolina.

Revolution and stalemate in the '90s

November 8, 1994 was a historic day for the GOP. Running on a Reaganesque "Contract With America," which included calls for a balanced budget, a strengthened defense, welfare reform and tax cuts, Republicans gained control of both houses of the new 104th Congress for the party's first complete majority on Capitol Hill in four decades.

Not since the 83rd Congress during Eisenhower's first term had the party controlled both houses of Congress. Not a single Republican incumbent lost from coast to coast, and the party gained a net pickup of 52 House seats and nine Senate seats -- including the party switch of Alabama Sen. Richard Shelby the next day.

In addition, the GOP claimed 30 of the nation's 50 governorships, including eight of the 10 biggest electoral states, and drew even with Democrats in the state legislatures. To many, it seemed the long anticipated Republican realignment had arrived.

But while the new GOP Congress was able to steer Clinton toward supporting many of its goals, Clinton would have considerable success in sparring with them in the court of public opinion.

By the 1996 elections, after signing a welfare reform bill and a bruising fight with the GOP over spending and tax cuts that resulted in a partial government shutdown, Clinton had sufficiently recovered to win re-election against former Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole. Clinton defeated Dole by an eight-point margin with 49 percent of the vote in a three-way race. But Republicans succeeded in re-electing their congressional majority for the first time since 1928.

After the 1996 elections, Clinton and the GOP reached a balanced budget compromise that included tax cuts and more social spending, though less and more than respectively wanted by Republicans. Before long, the nation would enjoy a balanced budget and continuing surpluses, with government spending rising to record levels.

The 1997 agreement illustrated both the successes and frustrations of the GOP under Clinton. 1998 would see the Capitol gripped in the throes of the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal, freezing its politics in a poisoned equilibrium. Amid severe political infighting and intense partisanship on both sides, the November midterm elections saw the GOP maintain its congressional majority -- but just barely, losing a handful of seats.

House Speaker Newt Gingrich resigned after a close call for the GOP in the 1998 elections.

Historically, the party not in power in the White House gains seats in midterm elections, and the close call in the House resulted in the ouster of Speaker Newt Gingrich, a powerful but controversial figure who had led Republicans in taking the chamber in 1994. Though still in control of a majority of governorships, including eight of the 10 largest, California fell to the Democrats.

The following month, the House of Representatives ratified two articles of impeachment against Clinton. In February 1999, after a brief trial, the Senate acquitted Clinton when it failed to obtain the necessary two-thirds majority votes for the charges of lying under oath and obstruction of justice.

While having risen to its strongest position in years, what the Republicans have faced since taking power in 1994 is a stalemated and evenly matched politics. The GOP heads into the 2000 election hoping at last to complete their long-sought-after realignment.

Despite their continued strength in the statehouses, the congressional competition has grown successively tighter. The House GOP now has a majority of just 223-212. The Senate GOP is a bit more firm at 55-45, but even there Senate rules often leave Republicans stymied. And the presidential veto has proved a formidable obstacle.

Since the party first ran a presidential candidate in 1856, the GOP has won 21 of 35 presidential elections. But today, with neither party able to fully enact their policy prescriptions, the 2000 elections offer the GOP the opportunity to attain complete control of the government for the first time in 46 years.