GREAT BEND, Kan. - In the Civil War, the Republican party was the Union party and the Democratic party the Confederate party. Kansas was a Union state, and with that came the Republican party of Abraham Lincoln. Kansas has always been Republican because of it's ties to the Union.
If you ask most people, "What political party are you in, and why?" most will say, "Well, my Dad was a Republican, and his Dad was a Republican, and that's just the way it was." The Republican party of the Civil War was an anti-slavery party, and Lincoln it's first President.
The thing is, it didn't take long before the Republican party forgot about abolition and focused it's energy on helping big business. The decline in abolitionist zeal was quite
apparent. In fact, by 1890 the Republican party was "a closely held institution largely managed by railroad lawyers who made little attempt to conceal their control of Republican state conventions." (Lawrence Goodwin, Democratic Promise: The Populist Movement in America
After the Civil War, Republicans could win the vote of the "common man" easily by "waving the bloody shirt," referring to the blood of the martyrs and heroes who helped the Union win the Civil War. Former Union soldiers were admonished to "Vote how you shot," in the Civil War. And it worked, for a while.
In 1890 the Populist Party (known as "The People's Party," ) snuck up on the Republicans, got outside the Civil War paradigm, and kicked the Republicans in Kansas to the curb. 96 out of 125 seats in the Kansas House of Representatives were now held by "The People's Party," fighting for the "little man", the farmer, the merchant. 18 year Republican incumbent U.S. Senator John Ingalls was tossed out of office. It was a tsunami.
1890 marked the high water mark of Populism in Kansas, and even by 1892 Kansans showed remarkable "brand loyalty" to the Republican party. The Populist party eventually fused with the Democratic party, and the movement lived on for a time through Democrat Presidential nominee William Jennings Bryan.
The lesson of 1890 was this: never again could Republicans allow an election to be framed as "We the People" vs. "Big Money." There a lot more people out there than there are aristocrats, so the Republican party had to make sure that this framing of the debate never happened again.
McKinley's handlers faced this problem in the election of 1896: "Given the ballot box potentiality of "the people" as against the great trusts and combinations, Republicans obviously could not afford to have the campaign decided on that basis." (Id. at 524) So they changed the subject. They made the campaign about broad themes, such as "the progressive society."
Although the Republican party was started as an anti-slavery party, today the Republican party represents big business, and the Democratic party is supposed to represent "We the People." If people voted based on that paradigm, the Democrats would win every time. Because there are a lot more people than there are corporate titans.
If only things were that clear. The "New Democrat" program introduced by Bill Clinton basically told Democrat politicians to cozy up to Big Business, which they did. That's where the money is. The Obama administration seems to have done more for Wall Street fat cats than for everyday Kansans. So it's harder for Democrats to stand out as the party of "We the People."
And the Republicans had a firewall to protect them from public wrath, which is to convince people that elections are not about big business vs. "the little man," but are about values only. "We have lost our country," they say. "Look at the way morality has collapsed!" And so the voters vote based on issues like abortion, and forget the fact that their wages have declined, that they don't have health insurance, that the rich are getting richer. (see What's the Matter with Kansas?
The water has been muddied, and people feel that both parties are out for Wall Street, not Main Street. But it's not too late for Democrats to do the right thing. If Democrats go back to their Jacksonian/Jeffersonian roots of "We the People," and forego the campaign cash of the big corporate powers, we might not have flashy TV ads, but we will have the everyday Kansan on our side.
The Republican nightmare of 1890 when the peasants with pitchforks scared the daylights out of the money elites could happen again - but we have a long ways to go.
Marty you are right on, again! It sure wouldn't hurt for Democrats to get beck to supporting working men and women through Unions. Keep these articles coming.
Marty, thanks for the history and the context. As I commented in someone else's post, I've always voted for Democratic candidates, but never been a supporter of the Democratic Party for the reasons you cited at the end of your post: they've spent far too much time cozying up to the very people--with their twisted logic and money--whose aim is to screw the average citizen. And, as I said in a post of my own, it's time to take off the gloves and talk about class because that's what the political debate has become and we might as well call it like it is. If the Democratic Party can't or won't take on this issue, it will cease to have any real meaning in American politics after the 2010 elections. The passage of the health care bill by the House has to be followed up with other legislation that keeps economic issues front and center. If the Democrats fail to lead and keep up this momentum then I fear that it will be many years before they have any kind of reasonable majority again in U.S. politics.
This is one of the best concise analyses of the political situation that I have read. Thanks for posting it!
I don't know how it will happen, but people from both sides have to come together now if we want to save our democracy. It has been completely corrupted by monied interests. I don't believe that one party can fix that. I think it is going to take a combined effort by self-described Democrats and Republicans to cut off the spigot of corruption and take our country back.
I would hope that people who read your post would see that it does not point fingers at either side, but describes the situation as it has evolved and now exists. Perhaps then we could come together and take appropriate action.