In 1860 the Republican Party, at a contested election, selected Lincoln as their nominee. They also established that the party supported the limitation of slavery to the south and opposed its expansion in the west. As Lincoln said during the campaign, slavery in the south was a snake in the bed that had to be limited. This decision by the party established its historical reputation as a party that supported the power of the national government and that the Constitution reigned over the states and not the other way around.
By 1960 the party was suffering from an identity crisis. World War Two, the New Deal, the rise of America as a world power, the dawn of the civil rights movement and the fall of Jim Crow, the rise of Kennedy and southern resistance to the end of segregation all left the Republican Party with a need for ideological purpose. Then came Barry Goldwater and his book The Conscience of a Conservative. Goldwater established what American conservatism would mean for the remainder of the century and well into the next.
Goldwater wrote that the problem with the Republican Party was that it was little different than the Democratic Party. Both parties believed in big government, the primacy of the federal government, government intervention in the affairs of the states, regulation of business and private enterprise and identity politics. The difference between the parties was the selection of beneficiaries of government favor.
Goldwater wrote that a true conservative believes in limited government, limited regulation of business, a flat tax, law and order in the streets and no federal interference with the social and racial decisions of the states regarding its citizens. He opposed civil rights on the premise that the rights of blacks were a local matter and the federal government had no power, much less right, to address and oppose segregation. If the southern states wanted Blacks to be second class citizens, that was for the states to decide, not the federal government.
The significance of 1960 is that it formed the basis for his takeover of the ideological base of the Republican Party in 1964. In 1960, Goldwater found no purpose for the federal government outside of military protection from invasion and law enforcement protection from street criminals. He supported little to no regulation of the private sector.
Between 1964 and 1972, along with George Wallace and Richard Nixon, Goldwater conservatism took hold and dominance of Republican Party identity. The fruition of this dominance occurred in 1980 with Ronald Reagan. Reagan was able to paper over differences between types of conservatives and was able to provide victories in elections that eluded Goldwater.
Reagan conservatives from 1988 through 2012 have asserted that Reagan won because of his conservative purity and that subsequent Republican candidates have lost because they were weak conservatives ideologically, if they were conservatives at all. The American people, conservatives argued, would vote and elect a conservative if the candidate was a true conservative in the line of Reagan. Ted Cruz in 2016 was in complete agreement.
Cruz, a Goldwater conservative, offered an ideologically pure vision for the party and the nation. He was the heir of Goldwater, not Reagan, in his ideological beliefs. Goldwater, unlike Reagan, was an absolutist true believer. In 2016, conservatives in the party thought their time had come and that they would prove that all that was required for a Republican landslide victory was a ticket headed by a conservative purist, an heir to Goldwater absolutism. Their dreams had come true.
Then came Donald Trump. Trump is a pragmatic economic nationalist who has no ideological imperatives or absolutes. Trump says and does whatever is necessary to achieve his goals. The last three months were a direct battle for the party by these two philosophical approaches. But the dreams of the Goldwater/Reagan conservatives were lost last week when Trump laid waste to Cruz in Indiana – Cruz’s last stand. Trump beat Cruz by more than 15 points. Cruz bowed to his defeat and suspended his campaign.
The following day the Republican establishment candidate, Governor John Kasich, also bowed to the Trump onslaught and suspended his campaign. Trump now stands alone as the Republican nominee for president. The republican voter, to the shock of conservatives, when given a choice, chose the pragmatic populist economic nationalist over the conservative states’ rights/limited government ideologue.
The significance of the defeat of Goldwater conservatism within the Republican Party may be the same as the liberal northern Republicans’ loss to Goldwater in 1964. Goldwater’s victory pushed liberal Republicans into exile and redefined the meaning and purpose of the party. Up until last week the party was unquestionably known as the party of conservatives. With the victory of a non-ideological, pragmatic, economic nationalism, nativist immigration, strong federal government, non-neo-con foreign policy candidate over a Goldwater conservative, the party may be on the verge of a new identity.
The change in party identity does not need Trump to win in November, but the change needs to maintain support in subsequent elections and how those elections are won. Goldwater conservatism prevailed because in 1966 and 1968 the Republican Party won midterm and general elections advocating Goldwater’s ideas. Nixon and then Reagan won and infused their ideas into the next generation of young republicans.
What the future will bring is an answer to whether Trump is only a man of the 2016 republican primary election psychology or a man who transformed how America thinks about politics, defines the purpose of government, and votes in November 2016, 2018 and 2020. If Trump is the latter he, not Cruz, is the true heir of Goldwater.
Dr. Arthur Garrison is an assistant professor of criminal justice at Kutztown University. This piece is the work of Dr. Garrison and does not reflect the opinions of Kutztown University or its faculty, staff, students or alumni.
