Opinion of the Republican Party (1854-1874)

[TNF]

Probably the greatest party in American history. It's a shame that it ended up the way that it did, although its transformation into the monstrosity it is now was probably inevitable, given the way that the immediate postwar period went.

[TDAS04]

Massive FP (sane) 

[Rockefeller GOP]

Obviously a freedom party, and well past those dates, too.

[Lief 🗽]

Probably the greatest party in American history.

Yeah, I think that's true. The greatest major party at least (Socialist Party from 1900 to 1920 was pretty great). The only real competition is the Democratic Party under Roosevelt and Truman, but too much of it was racist Southrons.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Certainly the greatest major party in American history. (I can name a handful of better minor parties that have popped up at various times.)

[Modernity has failed us]

Undoubtedly the greatest party in American history.

[New_Conservative]

Obviously a freedom party, and well past those dates, too.

[Phony Moderate]

The only period in American history in which a major party was genuinely radical. FP.

[GaussLaw]

Obviously a freedom party, and well past those dates, too.

[Miles]

Yankee party = HP

[IceSpear]

Obviously a freedom party, and well past those dates, too.

Yeah, Ted Cruz and Michele Bachmann would make Lincoln proud.

[Rockefeller GOP]

Obviously a freedom party, and well past those dates, too.

Yeah, Ted Cruz and Michele Bachmann would make Lincoln proud.

Way to extrapolate.  Roosevelt, Coolidge, Eisenhower and Reagan all would.  You'll only find partisan red avatars disputing that, going along with the revisionist notion that the original GOP was this epic catalyst of progressivism.  I guarantee you that every Democrat on this forum, if they looked at non-slavery issues, would have more in common with the motives of early Democrats than they would with early Republicans.  Now, is slavery enough to tip the scales?  God, I'd hope so ... But that doesn't lead to this conclusion that because a modern day liberal would have been a Republican back then --> that Republican Party was liberal.  Simply ridiculous.

[IceSpear]

Obviously a freedom party, and well past those dates, too.

Yeah, Ted Cruz and Michele Bachmann would make Lincoln proud.

Way to extrapolate.  Roosevelt, Coolidge, Eisenhower and Reagan all would.  You'll only find partisan red avatars disputing that, going along with the revisionist notion that the original GOP was this epic catalyst of progressivism.  I guarantee you that every Democrat on this forum, if they looked at non-slavery issues, would have more in common with the motives of early Democrats than they would with early Republicans.  Now, is slavery enough to tip the scales?  God, I'd hope so ... But that doesn't lead to this conclusion that because a modern day liberal would have been a Republican back then --> that Republican Party was liberal.  Simply ridiculous.

I think you took that post a tad more seriously than it was intended to be taken.

[H. Ross Peron]

One of the two greatest parties in American history along with the Democratic Party from 1932 to 1968.

[RINO Tom]

The only period in American history in which a major party was genuinely radical. FP.

Just finished an advanced Civil War class, and I have to take issue with this assertion.  The Republican Party was simply founded on the belief that slavery should be halted and not allowed to expand to the West, in other words to strangle it from without ... this was a very popular sentiment in the North by the 1850s.  The party (and not even all of the party) didn't support abolition until the middle of the Civil War as a wartime measure, and by then most records show that the war had spurred popular support in the North for abolition; it was definitely not fringe by that point, and not even all of said "fringe" party supported it.  Though there were several Republicans who wanted slavery stopped on moral grounds (and, to be fair, several Northern Democrats, too...), but there was also a significant faction who saw it as equally economically impractical.  Cheap slave labor was not exactly popular among Northern business elites, and several Republican politicians were more than influenced by that complaint.

As a proud Republican whose favorite president is Abraham Lincoln and who feels immense pride about the abolition of slavery, I am not trying to take anything away from things like the Emancipation Proclamation or the Thirteenth Amendment; I'm just pointing out that history isn't simple, and it's probably generous (I think, in this sense?) to declare the Republican Party of the 1850s "radical," especially if you mean it in the sense that they were all morally superior freedom fighters completely set on elevating American Blacks to complete equality, a fairy tale version of history quite prevalent in elementary school coloring books...

[RINO Tom]

Obviously a freedom party, and well past those dates, too.

[Maistre]

Well, Lincoln's invasion did kill several of my ancestors around Vicksburg, so I am inclined to vote HP.

[Rockefeller GOP]

Well, Lincoln's invasion did kill several of my ancestors around Vicksburg, so I am inclined to vote HP.

Your ancestors committed treason and were defending a pseudo-government that condoned the enslavement of human beings. :/

[politicus]

Well, Lincoln's invasion did kill several of my ancestors around Vicksburg, so I am inclined to vote HP.

Your ancestors committed treason and were defending a pseudo-government that condoned the enslavement of human beings. :/

That is a very legalistic interpretation of history.

If a government controls the territory it claims, its not a pseudo-government.

[TNF]

The only period in American history in which a major party was genuinely radical. FP.

Just finished an advanced Civil War class, and I have to take issue with this assertion.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

http://isreview.org/issue/79/reading-karl-marx-abraham-lincoln

[Rockefeller GOP]

The only period in American history in which a major party was genuinely radical. FP.

Just finished an advanced Civil War class, and I have to take issue with this assertion.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

http://isreview.org/issue/79/reading-karl-marx-abraham-lincoln

In the same way that calling someone a "conservative" in the 1850s would not have been the same as calling someone a "conservative" now, he was clearly not referring to all people who subscribe to capitalism ... I mean you can't possibly believe Lincoln wasn't a capitalist.  I know you have this grandiose view of your ideology, but it's just wrong.

[Illuminati Blood Drinker]

One of the two greatest parties in American history along with the Democratic Party from 1932 to 1968.

[ElectionsGuy]

One of the greatest parties in American History.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Freedom Party, though probably less radical than being made out to be by some here..but in that time, in this country?

Yeah, Freedom Party for sure.

[Mechaman]

Freedom Party, though probably less radical than being made out to be by some here..but in that time, in this country?

Yeah, Freedom Party for sure.

Pretty much this.

I would really hesitate to call it the "Greatest Party ever" given that the GOP had very pro-wealth elements in it even in the very beginning.  Lest us not forget this was the party of the Civil War Draft after all.

If anything, I would say that it was a very grey area party that was very naive about the nature of wage slavery.  Mainly that they thought it was something that would suddenly go away sometime in the late 19th century but was actually there to stay.

Still much more morally superior to the GOP that succeeded it though.