20 years on, 'big tent' still proves elusive
By Tom Baxter
Southern Political Report
December 10, 2009 — The metaphor had already been around politics for a while when the late Lee Atwater made the comment, 20 years ago, that the Republican Party was a “big tent” and could encompass many points of view. But Atwater’s comment touched something deep in the GOP psyche, and it has rattled around in the Republican consciousness ever since. Atwater envisioned a future in which younger voters with much different views than their elders on views like abortion would come to play a greater role, and the ideological common ground of the party would broaden. A new generation didn’t ease the tension between ideological purity and the ambition to forge a lasting majority, however. Two recent stories out of the Carolinas illustrate how that conflict remains as sharp today as it was when Atwater worked to consolidate the party behind former President George H.W. Bush. Last month, the executive committee of the Charleston County Republican Party passed a resolution censuring US Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) for co-sponsoring a “cap and trade” energy bill with US Sen. John Kerry, among a long list of grievances. The resolution excoriated Graham for stating “on many occasions that his primary concern is ‘to be relevant’,” and weakening “the Republican brand.” Here the balance was clearly in favor of ideological purity, and the tent wasn’t even big enough to include the state’s senior senator. Graham has tested party orthodoxy in the past, but an official censure, from a county where Republicans have always had the reputation of being less doctrinaire than their Upcountry brethren, was a sign of how testy the relationship has become. Later in the month, the executive committee of the North Carolina Republican Party took up another resolution, one that would have banned unaffiliated voters from participating in Republican primaries in the state. North Carolina currently has close to 2.8 million registered Democrats, more than 1.9 million Republicans and close to 1.4 million unaffiliated voters. The resolution was very clear in its intent: "Primary turnout is generally low. Registered unaffiliated voters are affecting the outcome of the Republican nominee for the November general election resulting in a more moderate candidate being elected in some areas of the state," it said. In this case the big-tent battle went the other way. The executive committee solidly rejected the resolution, preferring to give that huge pool of unaffiliated the chance to get in the habit of voting Republican, even at the risk of producing more “moderate” Republican candidates. Clearly, this was a nod to the big-tent philosophy. But what if there’s more than one tent? A lot of eyebrows were raised this week by a Rasmussen poll which showed that in a generic ballot test, more voters (23 percent) would prefer a Tea Party candidate, assuming there were such a thing, to a Republican candidate (18 percent). Clearly, that’s not good news for the Republican “brand.” But what didn’t get as much attention were the other two numbers. Despite all the Democrats’ recent problems, 36 percent of the voters preferred a Democrat, while 22 percent were undecided. It’s that last group which could be crucial: None of the parties come close to 50 percent, which means they all will have to convince some undecided – and in all likelihood, non-ideological –voters to go their way. Over the long run, that could be a more difficult proposition for a party which has come to define itself so strictly by its ideology. Democrats have their problems with inclusiveness and ideology, but nothing on the order of Republicans. There will be a lot of grousing among Democrats over the deal in the Senate this week which drops the public option plan from the health care reform bill. But don’t expect any county Democratic parties in Arkansas to censure US Sen. Blanche Lincoln. Follow Tom Baxter on Twitter. |
