The Real Republicans, Part One

Editor's Note: The following is the first post of an essay by Martin Rybicki, a student at the University of Texas-San Antonio. In this essay, Rybicki is making the case that moderate and liberal Republicans have had a place in the GOP since it's creation and argues that they belong in the party. Here is the first installment of, The Real Republicans: The Case for Moderates, Liberals, and Pragmatic Conservatives in Our Party.

I had been thinking through this for quite some time now, as for the last few weeks I had been too busy to put it into writing; the case for moderate and liberal republicans and their rightful place in our party. Then came along just a few weeks ago the defection of Arlen Specter, the moderate republican from Pennsylvania and one of the only 3 self proclaimed moderates from the northeast. Now there are two. There is no doubt among a majority of moderates in our party (what’s left of us) that this was a punch in our gut. It really hurt, to say the least as each and every moderate that is lost is a major loss regardless of how we personally viewed him. Whether he was opportunistic and didn’t stand for principle or he was truly being pushed out of a party that he would have nicely fit in a few years back doesn’t matter as the moderate faction that he helped make up had taken numerical blow. A few weeks passing this occurrence with all that has come about as a result of this action, I nevertheless believed that now is the time to rally the remaining centrist republicans and to let them know why they not only have a place in the GOP but as I will also show, a leading role in our party.

In trying to find out who we should be as Republicans we must first look back in history to see what the party stood for. Many in the party, hard-line conservatives for the most part, are calling for a return to the roots of the Republican Party. Fair enough. I think that is precisely what we should do. And to do this, the facts that can be bothersome to some must be brought to the forefront of this internal debate. The roots of the party, of course, must be from the very beginning of its conception.

The Republican Party was formed in the late 1850’s in response to the democrats who supported the expansion of slavery into the new territories, which the new party was vehemently opposed to. The party was from the beginning, a progressive party and by no means a conservative one. It was a party that sought to modernize the country, not to keep the status quo especially if the status quo was not working for Americans. They sought to modernize the country by supporting higher education, free homesteads to farmers (a rather non-conservative thing to do), free soil policies against slavery, banking, railroads, industry and cities. This was a party that not only was aiming for the rural vote via homesteads, but also one that had a heavy lean towards urban America. Again something that is not apparent with today’s conservative controlled Republican Party. It was a party that believed industry and free markets were superior to slave driven ones. These were the founding principles of the party and it is these principles that should define real republicanism instead of what has crept into the party over the last few decades. Taking into account these founding ideas must also include Abraham Lincoln himself who was a man of principle as well as pragmatism in being the first iconic leader of the Republican Party. Lincoln from his early years warned against the slave holding southerners continuing power growth of the government.

The Act has a… covert real zeal for the spread of slavery, I cannot but hate it. I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our republican example of its just influence in the world — enables the enemies of free institutions, with plausibility, to taunt us as hypocrites — causes the real friends of freedom to doubt our sincerity, and especially because it forces so many really good men amongst ourselves into an open war with the very fundamental principles of civil liberty — criticizing the Declaration of Independence, and insisting that there is no right principle of action but self-interest.[

- October 16, 1854, "Peoria Speech" Abraham Lincoln

It is important to acknowledge both his idealism as well as pragmatism when it came to slavery. Some in today’s community have been seeking to draw a Lincoln that although gave the Emancipation Proclamation, did so only because of expediency and because it would be a useful tool and as a result basically seeking to diminish his role as a major leader of civil rights in America and one who stood for a party that strongly stood for civil rights. His above speech made years before he even became president and many others before and during his presidency show that he was indeed a man of principles in belief of slavery being a gruesome affront to Americanism. This does not contradict at all with his statement years later about slavery when he stated that he would try to keep the Union intact by outlawing slavery or not. He realized that even in the north, slavery existed and while he believed it to be an abomination it was not something that could be done in a sloppy fashion without prudent forethought. Social changes need to take into account society’s current stance on the issue itself. His delivery of the Emancipation Proclamation was perfectly timed to accomplish many things, one of which was to capitalize on the major Union victory of Gettysburg and the renewed sense that the war could be won. The president sensed the opportunity to get the ball rolling towards getting the public to support the war in trying to reunite the Union as well as using it as an opportunity to start leading the nation towards freedom and justice for all.

All of this is necessary so as to show how principles and pragmatic thinking can be intelligently intertwined to create a powerful voice of reason and justice. With Lincoln and his “pragmatic idealism” being at the beginning of the Republican Party’s creation, we can now look at how the party can return to its actual roots that we have slowly abandoned over the years and that we centrists as the “true” republicans must realize and stand up for. The party was a party that stood against slavery because it easily recognized the obvious evil of human enslavement, but also easily recognized the potential of industry to transform the nation towards progress and to end the inefficient slave driven agriculture of the south. This would have the potential therefore, to not only do a great good for a people suffering injustice but also to possibly lead America down a path of modernization and prosperity never before seen before. This would be a prosperity that would be aimed towards all Americans and not merely a small segment of the population. With Lincoln at the beginning and at the helm for those important years, he along with the other beginning Republicans set the stage for the party to drive this thrust for progress, prosperity and justice and the flexibility needed to accomplish this for many years to come.