Rockefeller Republican

Rockefeller Republican (often termed "moderate Republican") refers to a faction of the United States Republican Party who held moderate to liberal views similar to those of Nelson Rockefeller. The term largely fell out of use by the end of the twentieth century, and has been replaced by the term "moderate Republican." Modern Rockefeller Republicans are typically center-right, reject far-right policies, and are culturally liberal. Many espouse government and private investments in environmentalism, healthcare and higher education as necessities for the nation's growth, in the tradition of Nelson Rockefeller, Alexander Hamilton and Theodore Roosevelt. In general, Rockefeller Republicans oppose socialism and the redistribution of wealth while supporting some pragmatic regulation of business and federal social programs in matters pertaining to the public good. They represent a diversity of views on foreign policy, but historically most were considered "hawks" against communism and strong supporters of American business abroad. Richard Nixon -- a moderate, establishment Republican within the Party's contemporary ideological framework—founded the Environmental Protection Agency, cooled tensions with China and the Soviet Union, and in 1971 announced he was a Keynesian.^[1] Rockefeller Republicans were very common in the New England, West Coast, and the Middle Atlantic States, where there are liberal constituents.^[2]

History

Thomas E. Dewey, governor of New York from 1942 to 1954 and the Republican presidential nominee in 1944 and 1948, was the leader of the moderate wing of the Republican Party in the 1940s and early 1950s, battling conservative Republicans from the Midwest led by Senator Robert Taft of Ohio, known as "Mr. Republican." With the help of Dewey, General Dwight D. Eisenhower defeated Taft for the 1952 presidential nomination and became the leader of the moderates. Eisenhower coined the phrase "Modern Republicanism" to describe his moderate vision of Republicanism.

After Eisenhower, Rockefeller emerged as the leader of the moderate wing of the Republican party, running for President in 1960, 1964 and 1968. Rockefeller Republicans suffered a crushing defeat in 1964 when conservatives captured control of the Republican party and nominated Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona for President.

Other prominent figures in the GOP's Rockefeller wing included Pennsylvania Governor Raymond P. Shafer, Illinois Senator Charles H. Percy, Oregon Senator Mark Hatfield, Arkansas Governor Winthrop Rockefeller, Nelson's younger brother (who was somewhat of an aberration in a conservative, heavily Democratic Southern state) and President Richard Nixon.^[3][4]

After Rockefeller left the national stage in 1976, this faction of the party was more often called "moderate Republicans" or Nixonians, in contrast to the conservatives who rallied to Ronald Reagan.

Historically, Rockefeller Republicans were moderate or liberal on domestic and social policies. They typically favored New Deal programs and a social safety net; they sought to run these programs more efficiently than the Democrats. Rockefeller Republicans also saw themselves as champions of "good government", contrasting themselves to the often corrupt machine politics of the Democratic Party (particularly in large cities). They were strong supporters of big business and Wall Street; many Republicans of the Eisenhower-Rockefeller vein were major figures in business, such as auto executive George W. Romney and investment banker C. Douglas Dillon. In fiscal policy they favored balanced budgets, and were not averse to raising taxes in order to achieve them; Connecticut Senator Prescott Bush once called for Congress to "raise the required revenues by approving whatever levels of taxation may be necessary".^[5] In state politics, they were strong supporters of state colleges and universities, low tuition, and large research budgets. They favored infrastructure improvements, such as highway projects. In foreign policy, they tended to be Hamiltonian, espousing internationalist and realist policies, supporting the United Nations and promoting American business interests abroad.

Barry Goldwater crusaded against the Rockefeller Republicans, beating Rockefeller narrowly in the California primary of 1964. That set the stage for a conservative resurgence, based in the South and West in opposition to the Northeast Rockefeller wing. However, in 1968 the moderate contingent captured control of the GOP again and nominated Richard Nixon. He was easily reelected in 1972 and after he resigned, moderate republican Gerald Ford replaced him as president. Four years after nearly toppling the incumbent Ford in the 1976 presidential primaries, Ronald Reagan won the party's presidential nomination at the 1980 convention, and served two terms in the White House. By 1988, the Republicans had chosen Prescott Bush's son, George H. W. Bush -- who had only eight years before labeled Reagan's fiscal policies "voodoo economics" -- as its presidential candidate on a conservative platform. Bush's national convention pledge to stave off new taxation were he elected president ("Read my lips: no new taxes!") marked the candidate's full conversion to the conservative movement and, perhaps, the political death knell for Rockefeller Republicanism as a prevailing force within Party politics.

Yet the Rockefeller Republican label is sometimes applied to such modern-day politicians as Senators Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine.^[6][7][8]Another is former Senator Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island,^[9] a liberal in cultural as well as international respects. The departure of U.S. Senator Jim Jeffords from the Republican party in 2001 dramatized the still-existing tension between the liberals of the party and what is today its generally more influential socially-conservative wing. The term could also be applied to former U.S. Representative Connie Morella of Maryland, who lost re-election in 2002 to Democrat Chris Van Hollen. In the 2006 elections after many moderate Republicans were defeated, including Lincoln Chafee, Nancy Johnson and Rob Simmons of Connecticut, Charlie Bass of New Hampshire, and Jim Leach of Iowa, the prominence of Rockefeller Republicans dwindle even further. The 2009 departure of Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter from the Republican Party further reduced their numbers. However, in 2010 Bass won his old seat and Chafee won the Rhode Island gubernatorial election, albeit as an Independent.

Ethnic changes in the Northeast may have led to the demise of the Rockefeller Republican. Many Republican leaders associated with this title were WASPs (New York U.S. Senator Jacob Javits, a practicing Jew, was a notable exception). As time went on, the local Republican parties tended to nominate Catholic candidates who appealed to middle class, social values-laden concerns, such as George Pataki, Al D'Amato, and Tom Ridge.

Disuse of the term

The term "Rockefeller Republican" is now somewhat archaic (Nelson Rockefeller having died in 1979), and Republicans with these views are now generally referred to as simply "moderate Republicans". Colin Powell is a noted modern person who referred to himself as a "Rockefeller Republican" as recently as 1995.^[10][11]

See also

• Nixonian
• Ripon Society
• Gypsy moth Republican
• Factions in the Republican Party (United States)
• Republican In Name Only
• South Park Republican
• Red Tory, in Canada
• Wets, in the United Kingdom
• Conservative Democrats, antonym

References

1. ^ Richard Reeves, President Nixon: Alone in the White House (2002) p. 295
2. ^ Reiter (1981)
3. ^ Halberstam, David. (1993). The Fifties. The Random House Publishing Group. New York. ISBN 0-449-90933-6. (pp.312-315)
4. ^ "If Nixon Were Alive Today,He Would Be Far Too Liberal to Get Even the Democratic Nomination"
5. ^ [The Right Nation, John Micklethwait and Adrian Woolridge, p 29]
6. ^ "How Maine's GOP Senators Are Key to Obama's Agenda",
7. ^ Cox, Stephen. A Liberal in Conservative Clothing. Liberty. March 2004
8. ^ "President Bush's Liberal Views"
9. ^ Christian Science Monitor: "And in the Senate, the epitome of the Rockefeller Republican, Senator Chafee"
10. ^ Forbes
11. ^ Fort Worth Star-Telegram

Further reading

• Burns, James MacGregor. The Deadlock of Democracy. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: 1967.
• Conrad Joyner. The Republican Dilemma: Conservatism or Progressivism (1963)
• Kristol, Irving. "American Conservatism 1945-1995." Public Interest 94 ( Fall 1995): 80-91.
• David W. Reinhard. The Republican Right since 1945 (1983)
• Rae, Nicol. Decline and Fall of the Liberal Republicans: 1952 to The Present. 1989.
• Reichley, A. James. Conservatives in an Age of Change: The Nixon and Ford Administrations. 1981.
• Reiter, Howard. "Intra-Party Cleavages in the United States Today." Western Political Quarterly 34 (1981): 287-300.
• Sherman, Janann. No Place for a Woman: A Life of Senator Margaret Chase Smith (2000)

External links

• Republican Main Street Partnership - Republican group interested in building a pragmatic center in the GOP.
• Progressive Republicans