Why don't republicans practice republicanism?

[ShawnD]

I'm reading some wiki articles about republicanism, and most of it sounds really good. It's so completely different from the modern republican party that it makes me wonder why they even have the same name.

Old republicans were against federalism and big government, but new republicans have lots of pork barrel projects like Reagan's Star Wars program, Nixon's War on Drugs, or Bush's Department of Homeland Security.

Old republicans supported state and individual rights.
New republicans are banning gay marriage, banning abortion, banning evolution, banning certain plants, banning freedom of speech, and banning whatever else some uneducated fundie disagrees with. They wreak of what Ben Franklin (republican) called tyranny of the majority.

Old republicans like Thomas Jefferson played a big role in writing the constitution and declaration of independence.
New republicans like Bush came up with the Patriot Act.

Old republicans like Jefferson warned about standing armies being dangerous to liberty.
New republicans like Reagan and Bush put more money into military spending than anyone in history.



Why doesn't this party exist anymore?

 

[mgb_phys]

That's nothing, we have a Labour (socialist) government that is busy privatising education and health and just spent £50B bailing out a dodgy bank.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I'm reading some wiki articles about republicanism, and most of it sounds really good. It's so completely different from the modern republican party that it makes me wonder why they even have the same name.

Old republicans were against federalism and big government, but new republicans have lots of pork barrel projects like Reagan's Star Wars program, Nixon's War on Drugs, or Bush's Department of Homeland Security.

Old republicans supported state and individual rights.
New republicans are banning gay marriage, banning abortion, banning evolution, banning certain plants, banning freedom of speech, and banning whatever else some uneducated fundie disagrees with. They wreak of what Ben Franklin (republican) called tyranny of the majority.

Old republicans like Thomas Jefferson played a big role in writing the constitution and declaration of independence.
New republicans like Bush came up with the Patriot Act.

Old republicans like Jefferson warned about standing armies being dangerous to liberty.
New republicans like Reagan and Bush put more money into military spending than anyone in history.



Why doesn't this party exist anymore?

Well said. AFAIK, the closest thing that we have are the Libertarians. In spite of his extreme solutions, Ron Paul's philosophy is much in line with this.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

Why doesn't this party exist anymore?

Perhaps it's because Jefferson was in the Democratic-Republican Party, the precursor of the Democratic party. The Republican party wasn't born until 1854, 28 years after Jefferson died. Lincoln was the first Republican President. He took us to war over the issue of states' rights.

 

[drankin]

I'd like to consider myself Republican, but who is a genuine Republican we can stand behind these days?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

The civil war was fought because the South seceded from the Union. The emancipation proclamation protected individual liberty over the rights of the States.

The original Republicans were also called Republicans, or Democratic-Republicans, or Jeffersonian Republicans. Later the party split, and one faction became the modern Democratic Party. The modern Republican party was formed in part by an alliance with the Liberty Party.

 

[BobG]

The civil war was fought because the South seceded from the Union. The emancipation proclamation protected individual liberty over the rights of the States.

The original Republicans were also called Republicans, or Democratic-Republicans, or Jeffersonian Republicans. Later the party split, and one faction became the modern Democratic Party. The modern Republican party was formed in part by an alliance with the Liberty Party.

It wasn't fought because of tariffs to prevent Southern states from buying British goods instead of Northern goods? Or because Republicans didn't feel states had the right to secede?

Regardless of how the parties stand today, at the time of the civil war, the Republican Party was the party of strong federal government, taxation, and civil rights.

While the two parties didn't exactly cross paths, they certainly circled around the issues until they wound up on the opposite side of where they started.

In fact, Jeffersonian Democrat or Jeffersonian Republican doesn't mean what it originally meant. Today it's practically a code word for racist (a linkage certainly encouraged by George Allen's maccaca comment).

 

[Ivan Seeking]

It wasn't fought because of tariffs to prevent Southern states from buying British goods instead of Northern goods? Or because Republicans didn't feel states had the right to secede?

If the South had not seceded, then there may not have been war. The Constitution does not allow States to secede.

 

[mheslep]

That's nothing, we have a Labour (socialist) government that is busy privatising education and health and just spent £50B bailing out a dodgy bank.

Wonderful. US is about to get into government health care just as the UK has figured out it doesn't work.

 

[mheslep]

Secession didn't actually set off the war. South Carolina arrogantly firing on the federally held Ft Sumter did.

 

[Anttech]

That's nothing, we have a Labour (socialist) government that is busy privatising education and health and just spent £50B bailing out a dodgy bank.

Labour hasnt been socialist since... ermm... thatcher :)

 

[DrClapeyron]

I always felt the issue was state's rights. If the states being annexed to the Union were not allowed to vote to decide if they could become a slave state this was seen as a violation of a state's right. Southern agrarian industry favored the state's right; it was seen as one way the southern agrarian practice of forced labor and indentured servitude would be allowed to exist in the modern age of industrialization. The north may never have moved towards a ban on slavery but domestic slave trade and slave owning practice were certainly jeapordized when national law outweighed the state law.

Yes, the Republican party has changed and so have our ambassadors who use to be great men like Ben Franklin who invented ovens, heaters, lighting systems among other things aside from diplomatic ties with France which secured our nation's independence. Now what do they do, simply engage only in diplomacy?

 

[mgb_phys]

Labour hasnt been socialist since... ermm... thatcher :)

No they just changed the lyrics slightly
"The waiter's cloth is deepest red, it covers oft our ciabatta bread ..."