This is not Mr. Lincoln's Republican Party

Abraham Lincoln's presidency is well-known, and for good reasons.  Of lesser recognition are the facts that he was the first Republican president, and the second presidential candidate of the Republican Party.  The first was John C. Fremont in the election of 1856.

Perhaps even less well-known is this:  in significant and amazingly contemporary ways, the Republican Party of one-and-a-half centuries ago was the polar opposite of what it is today.  For example, today's Republican Party for the early 21st Century positions itself as the champion of state's rights and of smaller government; smaller Federal government, anyway.  This is entirely the opposite of what the party stood for when it was founded and saw the election of its first U.S. President, Abraham Lincoln.

An adherent of the Republican Party who is reading this might have understandably negative reactions to these opening assertions.  A sampling of possible responses from that perspective could include things like -- "This guy is a Democrat and he doesn't know anything about the Republican Party!"  "What a dummy!"  "Where's he getting these screwy ideas?!?"  And those are probably among the milder ones.

If you've been reading this blog for a while now, you know that my essays will dredge up obscure historical facts and episodes and present them for one simple and very good reason:  history matters.  If you don't know how you got to where you are, then it's pretty hard to figure out where you are going.  In this case, where did the Republican Party come from, and where's it going now?

Today's Republican Party likes to evoke memories of Abraham Lincoln as a premier example of its heritage.  Lincoln--the first Republican President--was the "Great Emancipator," he guided the nation through the horrific and agonizing experience of the Civil War and ultimately was responsible for preserving the United States as a single nation, rather than seeing it split up into two.

Abraham Lincoln

All true.  But that's just part of the story.  The whole story is much more interesting.

According to my analog (pre-digital, pre-Internet) version of the Encyclopedia Britannica, the name "Republican" was chosen for the new party in 1854 because the intent was to draw in people who "generally placed the national interest above sectional interest and above states' rights."

Some might want to remark, "Well, so what?  It was all about slavery then.  That was a long time ago.  Things are really different now."

Good points (sort of).  Abolishing slavery was a catalyst for the formation of the Republican Party.  Boundless credit to the GOP for that.  But there was lots more to the American political scene then than just slavery.  In the mid-1800s the United States was confronting national issues dealing with economic growth, business development, infrastructure investment and immigration.

"Great Caesar's ghost!" you might say.  "Those things sound oddly familiar!"

Take a look at how the Republican Party of 1860--and its presidential candidate, Abraham Lincoln--addressed those national issues.  In addition to the confrontation over slavery, Chapter 8 of Doris Kearns Goodwin's "Team of Rivals" tells us that the stage was set for the electoral contest of 1860 when the Republican Party adopted a platform calling for ". . .a railroad to the Pacific, protection for naturalized citizens, and government support for harbor and river improvements. . ."

Route of the first American transcontinental railroad

At a time of national crisis, Mr. Lincoln and his Republican Party stood up and called for the preeminence of national imperatives over those of states' sovereignty; for assimilation of immigrants who were often unwelcome by big parts of the native-born American population; and for huge amounts of national infrastructure investment.

How do the Republican Party's 2012 platform and campaign pledges address today's issues of economic and business development, infrastructure investment, state's rights and immigration?  To me, the approach that today's GOP will make to such issues has only a tenuous connection with its origins.  The Republican Party does not seem to be capable of supporting, nor would it be even remotely spiritually-aligned with, notions of federal government policy solutions to national issues such as these.

However, Mr. Lincoln's Republican Party of the 1860s was strongly supportive of such policies.

The Republican Party was started with an abundance of great ideas.  The Party's formation history is an incredibly positive story.  But in recent years Republicans seem to have lost sight of much of this history.

Where is that Party headed now?