How the Republicans and Democrats switched roles over the past 150 years

[KennyR]

The topic says it all. I've brought up this point before, but this (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3340221.stm) is a little more substantial.

From it:

Initially radical and supportive of voting and civil rights for blacks, the Republicans were slowly forced to moderate their position to maintain their electoral dominance enabling Republican candidates to win five out of seven presidential elections between 1868 and 1892.

By the late 1880s the rise of industry and corporations transformed America and Republicanism was transformed with it, as industrial and business interests began to dominate the party.

The party also became associated with Protestantism and groups who felt threatened by the new waves of immigration, from Ireland, Italy and then later from Eastern Europe.

Through the 1960s the emergent conservative wing, first witnessed in Barry Goldwater's 1964 candidacy, began to push out liberal Republicans.

Etc.

In other words, a vaguely left leaning, liberal, progressive GOP has changed through time to be the staunchly right wing and conservative party it is now.

The point being, that if Abraham Lincoln were alive today, he'd be a democrat. :)

[adolescent]

And we started out as Communists... Times change I guess.

[T_Bone]

KennyR wrote:

The point being, that if Abraham Lincoln were alive today, he'd be a democrat. :)


If Abraham Lincoln were alive today, he'd be a dictator.

[Crumpster]

If Abraham Lincoln were alive today, he'd be incredibly old!!
:-P

Sorry, couldn't resist :-D

[T_Bone]

Anyone who's interested in Lincoln, or that thinks they know who he was and what he was about should read the books "The real Abraham lincoln" by Tibor R. Machan, and 'the real Lincoln" by L.C. Minor.

So much of what most people think about this man is simply revisionist history.

[Speelgoedmannetje]

If Abraham Lincoln were alive today, he'd be a dictator.That's probably because the vast majority of the Americans would vote for war.

[T_Bone]

Speelgoedmannetje wrote:
If Abraham Lincoln were alive today, he'd be a dictator.That's probably because the vast majority of the Americans would vote for war.


Actually there was no need for war at all during the Civil War. The Southern states had every right to secede, and Lincoln didn't have the authority to stop them.

The civil war had squat to do with slavery, Lincoln didn't even really free the slaves anyway, he only freed them in the states that had seceded (where he had no jurisdiction anyway, slaves where NOT free in states UNDER Lincolns jurisdiction!), and he even admitted that this was a ploy to weaken his opposition in a war that was already occuring, in addition to making the statement "If maintaining slavery could have won this war, I'd have done so. "

Lincoln was a Tyrant, who usurped the constitution, used Federal troops against his own citizens, disrupted elections to ensure his own reelections, he was our equivalent of Lennin. The democrats want him? They can HAVE him.

[KennyR]

Them's fightin' words, Reb. :-P

Do you really think Jefferson Davis, the man who represented people who accepted the KKK as normal, would have been better?

[Matt_H]

Actually there was no need for war at all during the Civil War. The Southern states had every right to secede, and Lincoln didn't have the authority to stop them.
That's actually been an issue in debate since then. I don't know if it's been resolved.

used Federal troops against his own citizens
Only after South Carolina's troops shelled a Federal fort in the harbor.

Nixon completed the unification of conservatives into the Republican party during his campaigns, finishing the trend that started during the Gilded Age.

[T_Bone]

Matt_H wrote:

That's actually been an issue in debate since then. I don't know if it's been resolved.

It's never been resolved. The Confederacy wasn't the only attempt at secession by states in the union. New Englind has considered it too.

used Federal troops against his own citizens
Only after South Carolina's troops shelled a Federal fort in the harbor.[/quote]

That event leads back to Buchannan, who refused to remove military forts from land not in it's jurisdiction. When Lincoln took over, he told the Confederacy that it was sending ships to restock and supply Fort Sumter. (The rest of the forts had been siezed by the south already, as they were no longer allowed in the Confederacy.) Lincoln told the Confederacy in advance it was sending reinforcements, the Confederacy recieved a "false surrender" from the troops Commander, saying he would surrender as soon as supplies ran out (But Lincoln had already told the Confederacy it was sending in more supplies and reinforcements!) Wise to this trick, the Confederacy attacked this last fort. We also now know that the Confederacy was right, that Lincoln WAS staging an attack from Fort Sumter.

When the Confederacy exposed Lincoln pulling this trick, four more states joined the Confederacy.

[Thellenbow]

I read the BBC article and have to say it was pretty well done. However, I think a similar discussion on the history of the democratic party might make you hair stand on end. After all, it was the democrats who passed all those segregation laws in the south. It was the democrats who voted against the civil rights bill in 1963 (while George H. W. Bush voted for it). While FDR was president, blacks were hanged in the south often while the northern democrats turned a blind eye. I used to be a democrat until I realized they are the party of duplicity, saying one thing out one side of their mouths and just the opposite out the other. They still do that today. As recent as last week, John Kerry told a group of working class people that he wanted to restrict trade. Next he told a group of business owners that he wanted to open up trade. Even better, right here in Boston, Kerry’s backyard, the democrats redrew the district lines for state representatives to insure that the white incumbents stayed in place despite the fact that whites are the minority. No districts were created with a non-white majority. Luckily, a federal judge threw it out and now they have six weeks to redraw the districts. :-)

[T_Bone]

KennyR wrote:
Them's fightin' words, Reb. :-P

Do you really think Jefferson Davis, the man who represented people who accepted the KKK as normal, would have been better?

The kkk didn't exist in 1861, it was formed 5 years later, in 1866. The kkk had nothing to do with the civil war, and didn't even exist untill the Confederacy had been defeated.

President Jefferson Davis and the kkk didn't even coexist in time.

(Although I wouldn't have voted for Davis anyway, he was a damned democrat! :lol: )

[edit - also of note, the kkk would beat and murder republicans of both colors who challenged the democrats at the polls]

[Fade]

I'll bet KennyR would be surprised to learn that Davis was recruited by the North to lead its army, but he turned them down.

[KennyR]

Fade wrote:
I'll bet KennyR would be surprised to learn that Davis was recruited by the North to lead its army, but he turned them down.

Wasn't that Robert E. Lee?

[T_Bone]

KennyR wrote:
Fade wrote:
I'll bet KennyR would be surprised to learn that Davis was recruited by the North to lead its army, but he turned them down.

Wasn't that Robert E. Lee?

See? You're surprised! :roflmao:

(lol, I don't know one way or the other, I'll have to google. :-))

[Fade]

Kenny is right on this one.

Found this:

"As battlefield opponents, the South had an edge in leadership; the North in the resources of war. Robert E. Lee had been Lincoln's first choice to lead the Northern troops. But Lee, a native Virginian, turned him down to command the Confederacy."

[T_Bone]

Fade wrote:
Kenny is right on this one.

Found this:

"As battlefield opponents, the South had an edge in leadership; the North in the resources of war. Robert E. Lee had been Lincoln's first choice to lead the Northern troops. But Lee, a native Virginian, turned him down to command the Confederacy."

You wern't wrong, you just said he'd be surprised. :-D