Memories of the Republican Party

There is an article in today’s Daily Local News titled “Pendulum swinging to the left” http://www.dailylocal.com/articles/2008/11/07/news/srv0000003990761.txt#blogcomments

Swing to the Left?

It is a swing toward the middle. The Republican Party of Eisenhower died years ago. What was described by President Eisenhower as a “radical fringe element” is now the “base” of the Republican Party.

“Hijacked by a relatively small few, the GOP of today bears no resemblance to Lincoln, Roosevelt or Eisenhower’s party, or many of the other Republican administrations that came after. In my grandparents’ time, the thrust of the party was rooted in: a respect for the constitution; the defense of civil liberties; a commitment to fiscal responsibility; the pursuit and stewardship of America’s interests abroad; the use of multilateral international engagement and “soft power”; the advancement of civil rights; investment in infrastructure; environmental stewardship; the promotion of science and its discoveries; and a philosophical approach focused squarely on the future.” Susan Eisenhower –
from Reflections on Leaving the Party-The National Interest Online
by Susan Eisenhower, 08.21.2008
http://www.nationalinterest.org/Article.aspx?id=19618

Younger persons, no matter what their political affiliation, may not realize that civic responsibility was at the core of the former, remembered Republican Party.

Desegregation began in the Eisenhower administration. I remember the “Little Rock Nine” and the photos of Army troops protecting them. The segregationists or as we called them “The Segs” were Democrats of the South.

President Nixon created the EPA and OSHA. Nixon promoted the Legacy Parks program and implemented the “Philadelphia Plan”; the very first affirmative action program.

The older registered Republicans in Chester County are clinging to the memory of the political party of their youth that has the same name but no longer exists. The Democratic Party as it now exists is nearly a mirror image of that remembered Republican Party of Country Clubs, Cadillacs and above all; civic responsibility.

This is from Wikipedia on President Eisenhower:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eisenhower

“Civil rights
Eisenhower supported the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka U.S. Supreme Court decision, in which segregated ("separate but equal") schools were ruled to be unconstitutional. The very next day he told District of Columbia officials to make Washington a model for the rest of the country in integrating black and white public school children.[41][42] He proposed to Congress the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960 and signed those acts into law. Although both Acts were weaker than subsequent civil rights legislation, they constituted the first significant civil rights acts since the 1870s. The "Little Rock Nine" incident of 1957 involved the refusal by Arkansas to honor a Federal court order to integrate the schools. Under Executive Order 10730, Eisenhower placed the Arkansas National Guard under Federal control and sent Army troops to escort nine black students into an all-white public school. The integration did not occur without violence. Eisenhower and Arkansas governor Orval Faubus engaged in tense arguments.”