Who Are Those Republicans Throughout History?

TO MAKE MEN FREE:  A History of the Republican Party
Heather Cox Richardson
Basic Books (September 23, 2014)
418 pages
ISBN: 0465024319

For John, BLUF:  Parties have a place.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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In the Sunday Book Review from The New York Times, we have a review of Professor Heather Cox Richarson's recent book, To Make Men Free:  A History of the Republican Party.  The reviewer is Mr Jonathan Rauch, who is a Senior Fellow at Brookings Institution.  The review suggests the reviewer likes the book, but doesn't like the Republican Party.  Or maybe doesn't understand it.  At any rate, his lede is:

America does not have a broken political system.  It has a broken political party: the Republicans.

As an example, Mr Rauch criticizes the Republican Party for not giving us immigration reform.  Maybe the Republicans on Capitol Hill recognized that the Grass Roots Republicans didn't want reform on the terms that Senate Majority Leader Reid and President Obama wanted it.

I did like this from the review's second paragraph.  I think it goes directly to the concerns expressed by some on City Life regarding the value of political parties:

In 1962, the political scientist James Q. Wilson wrote that parties “perform, to some degree, at least three functions in a democratic government.  They recruit candidates, mobilize voters and assemble power within the formal government.”

And, they reduce the effective factions to just a few, allowing for at least some legislation, like the CROmnibus Bill, which is funding the Federal Govern, and some state and local programs, for Fiscal Year 2015. Speaking of the founders Jefferson and Hamilton, as types of the two sides of the Republican Party, author Richardson says:

Both, unlike the political left, believe that equality comes from freedom, rather than the other way around.

I think this is an important point and one that points to our Declaration of Independence, a document cherished by Republicans out in the Grass Roots.  The other view, that if the Government gives you equality you will have freedom doesn't provide the same hope.

Political parties tend to be a bit chaotic.  Even monolithic parties, like the Communist Party and the National Socialist Party, tend to have divisions and factions.  I think Will Rogers summed it up thusly:

I am not a member of any organized party — I am a Democrat.

The same truth probably goes for Republicans, although the Democrats of today are a bit more organized than they were in the 1920s and 30s.

Hat tip to my Brother Lance.

Regards  —  Cliff