Free Republic

We oppose amnesty. The rule of law suffers if government policies encourage or reward illegal activity. The American people’s rejection of en masse legalizations is especially appropriate given the federal government’s past failures to enforce the law.

The clash includes issues of the environment, immigration, and gay rights As a senator, John McCain holds a reputation for diverging from many of his Republican colleagues on core party issues. Now, as the party’s presidential candidate, his record and policy views are putting him at odds with the overarching party platform adopted this week. On major issues like the environment, immigration, stem cell research and gay rights, the platform, which expresses the party’s philosophy, clashes with Mr. McCain’s longstanding positions or does not go as far as he has proposed in addressing subjects such as climate change. It is...

ST. PAUL, MINN. - Republican John McCain's primary campaign almost collapsed last year under the weight of opponents' attacks that he backed "amnesty" for illegal immigrants. As McCain prepares to accept his party's nomination for president tonight, past critics of the Arizona senator's position have rallied behind his candidacy. McCain, meanwhile, has backed away from signature immigration legislation and signed off on a party platform that makes a fence along the Mexican border a priority. The party's Twin Cities unity on immigration bridges, for now, an increasingly charged ideological rift for Republican candidates and campaigns. "We don't go around talking...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The 2008 Republican platform, in language that is hostile to illegal immigrants, says the makeup of Congress should be determined by counting only those legally residing in the United States in the next census. "The integrity of the 2010 census, proportioning congressional representation among the states, must be preserved," says the platform language, which is a reinterpretation of the Constitution that could affect how congressional seats are apportioned. "The census," it says, "should count every person legally abiding in the United States in an actual enumeration." The 14th Amendment of the Constitution, ratified in 1868, says representatives...

The GOP is making a dramatic change to its stance on climate change thanks to a “push” from presidential nominee Sen. John McCain, according to the 2008 Republican Platform Committee chairman. Platform Chair Rep. Kevin McCarthy, Calif., spoke to the group of conservative bloggers at the Republican National Convention on September 3 in St. Paul, Minn. He said McCain’s campaign was an instrumental part in pushing for a plank about climate change, to the chagrin of many conservatives.

The GOP is making a dramatic change to its stance on climate change thanks to a “push” from presidential nominee Sen. John McCain, according to the 2008 Republican Platform Committee chairman. Platform Chair Rep. Kevin McCarthy, Calif., spoke to the group of conservative bloggers at the Republican National Convention on September 3 in St. Paul, Minn. He said McCain’s campaign was an instrumental part in pushing for a plank about climate change, to the chagrin of many conservatives. “One thing you got to understand, when it comes to a platform, this is the difficulty that you have – you have...

To the Right of McCainPlatform politics. By Stephen Spruiell St. Paul — The Republican party has canceled most of Monday’s program due to Hurricane Gustav, but party delegates still plan to meet for a few hours to hold some pro forma votes. One of these will concern the adoption of a new party platform. The Republican Platform Committee hammered out the details during a series of meetings in Minneapolis last week. Conservatives should be pleased with the results. The new platform is distinctly different from the two adopted during the candidacies of George W. Bush, which were constructed to essentially...

St. Paul — The Republican party has canceled most of Monday’s program due to Hurricane Gustav, but party delegates still plan to meet for a few hours to hold some pro forma votes. One of these will concern the adoption of a new party platform. The Republican Platform Committee hammered out the details during a series of meetings in Minneapolis last week. Conservatives should be pleased with the results. snip... McCain now says that border security must come first... snip... The first draft of the 2008 platform leaned more towards McCain’s view. It attributed warming to human activity and called...

It’s a strange election year when one of the most important issues for voters is avoided by both presidential candidates. But that is exactly what has happened in 2008 with illegal immigration. Recently, some people have suggested that the Republican Party Platform should be similarly silent, or at least equivocal, on the issue. They are dead wrong. Think back to February 2008. Most of the contenders for the Republican presidential nomination were wrestling with one another to wear the mantle of “toughest on illegal immigration.” As Congressman Tom Tancredo correctly observed, the rest of the field “was trying to out-Tancredo...

Conservatives are thrilled with the platform just adopted in Minneapolis by the Republican National Convention Committee on Resolutions -- as the platform committee is formally known -- and which will be submitted for formal adoption to the full convention this week in St. Paul. The 2008 platform truly reflects the beliefs of the party and its activist base and is significantly more conservative than the one four years before. The working copy of the 2008 platform was drafted by party staff without the heavy-handedness often imposed by presidential nominees. In 2004, many activist conservatives were upset at the high-handed tactics...

I spoke with my mother, just before I left for Minneapolis to cover the Republican National Convention for American Thinker. My mother has been to a bunch of RNC conventions. She told me that they were all the same. "It was always the same old song," she said. Speaker after speaker promised to lower taxes, to cut back government red tape, to rein in federal spending. The crowds were almost hysterical, she told me. They were told exactly what they wanted to hear -- and they believed it. Mom said that she believed it too, at least for the first...

When I take the gavel at the Republican National Convention this week, Republicans will begin highlighting an agenda of freedom and security that will contrast sharply with what our Democratic counterparts displayed in Denver. Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin are uniquely positioned to be the standard-bearers of our reform agenda, and every day through Nov. 4, they and Republican candidates up and down the ballot will highlight our solutions on gas prices, the economy, security and health care — the issues that matter most to families, seniors and small businesses in Minnesota and across the country. In 2006,...

John McCain has just experienced a political Trifecta garnering the coveted conservative base that is absolutely necessary for any Republican to win an election. It is the very oxygen of the party i n much the same way liberals are the core of the Democratic Party. The first win for Senator McCain that shook his slumbering base was the Saddleback Forum where his direct answers that revealed conviction and resolve stood in sharp contrast to Barack’s fumbled, arrogant, non-answer responses. So distraught was the left that=2 0they had to create an immediate spin that McCain had the answers before hand....

A final draft of the Republican Party platform includes a first-ever plank on global warming that says human activity has contributed to climate change. "The same human activity that has brought freedom and opportunity to billions has also increased the amount of carbon in the atmosphere," the draft reads. "Increased atmospheric carbon has a warming effect on the earth." The GOP platform was approved by a 112-person platform committee in Minneapolis, Minn., late on Wednesday and will likely be ratified at the Republican National Convention on Monday. Conservative experts on global warming told CNSNews.com on Thursday that while they are...

TERRE HAUTE — While delegates have a vote during a national convention, Terre Haute attorney James R. Bopp Jr. has a much more involved role as part of a committee that has molded the official platform for the Republican National Convention at Minneapolis/St. Paul. The convention starts Monday and runs through Thursday, when Sen. John McCain of Arizona will make his acceptance speech for the Republican presidential nomination at St. Paul’s Excel Energy Center. Bopp, 60, is a national committeeman and is one of three Wabash Valley residents who as delegates are attending the national convention. The convention will host...

Noticed that two planks of the party's platform have changed? The one about drilling is gone. Buh bye ANWR. And the new one about global warming? Yeah, that's real conservative. *SARCASM*

WASHINGTON, August 28, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - As the Democratic Party officially nominated pro-abortion Senator Barack Obama for president and pro-abortion Senator Joe Biden for vice-president during the third day of their convention in Denver yesterday, the Republican Party Platform Committee, meeting in Minneapolis, adopted the strongest and most explicit support for life ever expressed by a major political party. "We applaud the Republican Party, and especially the members of the platform committee representing grassroots pro-life Republicans across the country, for making such a strong and unequivocal stand supporting life at all stages," said National Right to Life Political Director Karen...

While the Democrats play out the Billary –Obama Saga. The Republicans are at work finalizing their platform.

Minneapolis, MN -- The Republican Party's platform committee has put the finishing touches on a new party platform that contains some of the strongest language ever condemning abortion and supporting legal protections for unborn children. The platform stands in stark contrast to the pro-abortion plank Democrats approved Monday. The platform draws on the nation's founding documents as expressing the earliest support for human life but backs a Constitutional amendment to make those protections clear.

On the Spot (CNSNews.com) – A draft copy of the GOP platform, which was obtained by CNSNews.com on Wednesday, says “We oppose amnesty” for illegal immigrants. But Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), the presumptive presidential nominee for the Republican Party, has been a leading proponent in Congress for giving illegal aliens a “pathway to citizenship.” The GOP platform is being written in Minneapolis this week in preparation for the Republican National Convention, scheduled for early September. “It [the rule of law] does not mean driver’s licenses for illegal aliens, nor does it mean that states should be allowed to flout the...

Republicans seeking to put more teeth in the party's immigration platform ran into opposition from delegates who largely argued they didn't want to conflict with Sen. John McCain's positions. But the divide over hot-button topics such as "anchor babies" and "amnesty" was further complicated by McCain's public shift in the wake of his failed "comprehensive immigration reform" bill, with the presumptive Republican presidential candidate now acknowledging the strong mandate to emphasize securing the borders. The platform will be put before the party's delegates for a vote on the opening day of the convention Monday in the Twin Cities. Today, the...

By Michelle Malkin  •  August 27, 2008 03:48 PM Let’s recap, for a moment, what the GOP has been up to while the DNC circus has been carrying on in Denver.You’ve got the RNC running ads targeting open-borders Hispanic voters by touting John McCain as a stronger shamnesty supporter than Barack Obama. You’ve got McCain foolishly promoting an endorsement from open-borders reggaeton star Daddy Yankee.You’ve got GOP platform conferees refusing to combat pro-illegal immigration euphemisms.And now, you’ve got those platform writers throwing in the towel on drilling in ANWR in order to save face for John McCain, who’s on the same side...

All eyes may be on Denver this week, but the Republican National Committee began their meetings to draft an election platform today ahead of next week’s convention. Sparks flew when delegates got into debate over illegal immigration, which reflected where John McCain originally stood on the issue, but has now taken a more conservative stance. Delegates were split into different subcommittees and it was in the national security meeting where members got into heated discussion surrounding the issues of amnesty and English as the official language of the United States. Two delegates wanted to harden the language surrounding the issue...

MINNEAPOLIS - Republicans are putting John McCain's campaign priorities above some of their pet issues, including drilling for oil in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and denying citizenship to the U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants. Members of the GOP platform committee voted Wednesday to stick with an energy plank that doesn't mention drilling in the refuge, saying it would only highlight an area where they differ with the Arizona senator. McCain opposes drilling in that protected land, and some committee members said they would rather bring him around on the issue once he's in the White House than widen their...

MINNEAPOLIS - Republicans are putting John McCain's campaign priorities above some of their pet issues, including drilling for oil in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and denying citizenship to the U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants.

Stephen Spruiell at The Corner has been watching the Republican Platform Drafting Committee and thinks that Johnny Mac may be coming around, at least a little, on Global Warming. Republican Platform Committee . . . decided to strike the phrase “global warming” anywhere it appeared in the document, either replacing it with the more neutral “climate change,” or removing it altogether. Though "Climate Change" may be more ambiguous than "Global Warming," it still falls in the category of putting lipstick on a pig (you can call it what you want, it is still a pig), the change in terminology may...

Speaking of Minnesota . . . Stephen Spruiell is sussing out the Twin Cities in advance of the Republican National Convention, and reports on the GOP's latest platform draft over on the homepage. Spruiell finds the platform plank on immigration, for example, is worded in such a way as to avoid driving a wedge between McCain and his conservative base: The passages on global warming provide another example. The draft acknowledges that human activity is contributing to warming and calls for “measured and reasonable” steps to curtail it. Policymakers should support solutions that are “technology-driven, market-based,” and not fall prey...

All eyes may be on Denver this week, but the Republican National Committee began their meetings to draft an election platform today ahead of next week’s convention. Sparks flew when delegates got into debate over illegal immigration, which reflected where John McCain originally stood on the issue, but has now taken a more conservative stance. Delegates were split into different subcommittees and it was in the national security meeting where members got into heated discussion surrounding the issues of amnesty and English as the official language of the United States. Two delegates wanted to harden the language surrounding the issue...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 26 (UPI) -- The Republican platform may include a first-ever plank on global warming, an examination of a draft document indicated. "Increased atmospheric carbon has a warming effect on the Earth," The Hill reported the draft document as saying. "While the scope and long term consequences of this warming effect are the subject of ongoing research, we believe the United States should take measured and reasonable steps today." Sen. John McCain, poised to become the party's presidential nominee next week during the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minn., is a proponent of tackling global warming.

AP story, link only

The same article as the "GOP takes a hard line on abortion..." The committee passed a plank calling for English to become the nation's official language, but not without some sparks. Sue Everheart of Georgia said she feared the position would cost Republicans the support of immigrants. "I want every Republican vote out there," Everheart said.

GOP adds global warming to its 2008 platform By Jackie Kucinich Posted: 08/26/08 04:34 PM [ET] The National Republican Party for the first time is expected to acknowledge global warming in its 2008 GOP Platform, according to a draft of the document. “Increased atmospheric carbon has a warming effect on the earth,” the document said. “While the scope and long term consequences of this warming effect are the subject of ongoing research, we believe the United States should take measured and reasonable steps today.” Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), the party’s presumptive presidential nominee, is a strong proponent of tackling global...

Republicans are debating an election platform that differs in at least one striking way from the past _ it's purged of the dear-leader tributes that turned statements of party principles into an incessant hailing of the chief. In fact, a draft of the document going to the GOP platform committee Tuesday mentions 2008 presidential candidate John McCain and President Bush not at all. They'll be worked in later, in a section or two to be added. It's nothing personal, party officials hasten to say. Rather, they've put the platform on a crash diet. The 2004 platform ran over 40,000 words,...

There was a time, not all that long ago, when the conventions of the two major political parties were more than carefully orchestrated photo opportunities and pep rallies. The television networks have long since acceded to their audiences' wishes and ended the tradition of "gavel-to-gavel" coverage of these political jamborees. They are right to do so. Once the conventions stopped being news events and became endless partisan infomercials, there was no reason to treat them as being any different from any other garden-variety political rally. But that hasn't stopped the parties from continuing some of the time-honored traditions of the...

ABC News’ Karen Travers reports: The Republican National Committee today will unveil a web site, www.gopplatform2008.com, that will allow individuals to log on and share their suggestions and opinions on what should be included in the party’s platform. The platform will be ratified by the party’s delegates at its convention in Minneapolis in September. Starting Friday, an individual can log on to the site and upload their written comments or video comments. A team led by Platform Committee Executive Director Steven Duffield will sift through the online submissions up until the convention and party officials said they are open to...

ABC News’ Karen Travers reports: The Republican National Committee today will unveil a web site, www.gopplatform2008.com, that will allow individuals to log on and share their suggestions and opinions on what should be included in the party’s platform. The platform will be ratified by the party’s delegates at its convention in Minneapolis in September.

National Republican leaders unveiled a Web site Friday that they hope will encourage grass-roots participation in the shaping of the party's 2008 platform. Republican leaders say they think the site, www.gopplatform2008.com, will create an online community allowing anyone with access to a computer to offer ideas, to comment on others' ideas, and submit videos about their views. "I feel certain we'll get some great ideas," said Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., co-chairman of the Republican platform committee. "Will that be the majority? I have no way of gauging."

Conservative activists are preparing to do battle with allies of Sen. John McCain in advance of September's Republican National Convention, hoping to prevent his views on global warming, immigration, stem cell research and campaign finance from becoming enshrined in the party's official declaration of principles. .... McCain is "really out of step with the strong majority of his party," said Myron Ebell, director of energy and global warming policy at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which opposes McCain's positions on climate change. "He might get what he wants. And he might get a change. But I don't think it's going to...

Welcome to the most grassroots-driven platform development effort in the history of American politics! The Republican Party is seeking your input as we develop the policies and principles upon which we should stand for the next four years. On this website, you can share your thoughts, participate in polls, and communicate directly with the policymakers who will be shaping the party's agenda. All comments and feedback will be reviewed and taken into full consideration as we prepare for our convention in Minneapolis-St. Paul. We hope that this process will guarantee the greatest amount of public input into any platform in...

Conservative activists are preparing to do battle with allies of Sen. John McCain in advance of September's Republican National Convention, hoping to prevent his views on global warming, immigration, stem cell research and campaign finance from becoming enshrined in the party's official declaration of principles.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., faces enormous pressure from social conservatives to ignore his repeated commitment to change the GOP's platform on abortion. "If he were to change the party platform," to account for exceptions such as rape, incest or risk to the mother's life, "I think that would be political suicide," said Tony Perkins, the president of the conservative Family Research Council, to ABC News. "I think he would be aborting his own campaign because that is such a critical issue to so many Republican voters and the Republican brand is already in trouble." A senior Republican close to McCain...

Rep. Kevin McCarthy, 43, a prolife freshman Republican from California, will chair the platform committee for the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minn., The Washington Times has learned today. Steven J. Duffield, former aide to conservative Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona, will be the committee's executive director. In his first year in Congress, Mr. McCarthy had a 100 percent prolife voting record, according to the National Right to Life committee. Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, has let it been known through associates that he will not work to "soften" — even behind the scenes — the...

SANTA ANNA PUEBLO, N.M.— Advisers to Sen. John McCain's presidential bid say he will not try to "soften" the Republican party's platform on abortion and same-sex marriage to appeal to more voters. McCain associates told The Washington Times that his operatives are not going to work behind the scenes to eliminate the party's calls for constitutional bans on abortion and homosexual marriage before the GOP convention in September. Previous Republican nominees, such as former Kansas Sen. Bob Dole, have sought to alter the party's positions, which are honed and released in the platform immediately before the nominating convention. Mr. McCain,...

There was a time when the Republican Party was the ship that flew the banner of the Equal Rights Amendment. Mary Crisp went down with the Titanic, railing about women’s issues to the irate Reagan revolutionaries in the days leading up to the 1980 presidential convention. All revolutions have their heroines and heroes whose heresies lead them to be burned at the stake,” wrote Tanya Melich in “The Republican War Against Women.” “Mary Crisp was ours.” It was quite a finale for a woman who was basically a career volunteer, the prototypical ’50s suburban housewife who worked to put her...

(CNSNews.com) - Former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson, now running for the Republican presidential nomination, said on Sunday he does not support the pro-life plank that has been included in the Republican National Platform since the presidency of Ronald Reagan. Appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press," Thompson told host Tim Russert that he favors overturning Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that took the issue of abortion away from the states by declaring abortion a constitutional right. Thompson said he wants to keep abortion legal at the state level. "People ask me hypothetically, you know, OK, it goes back...

"Resolved, That we, the delegated representatives of the Republican electors of the United States, in convention assembled, in discharge of the duty we owe to our constituent and our country, unite in the following declarations: 1. That the history of the nation during the last four years has fully established the propriety and necessity of the organization and perpetuation of the republican party, and that the causes which called it into existence are permanent in their nature, and now more than ever before demand its peaceful and constitutional triumph. 2. That the maintenance of the principles promulgated in the Declaration...

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- Hundreds of prominent GOP activists met in Washington over the last four days for their annual summer meeting. With a presidential race and a battle over the party's platform coming up next year, several of the partisans said they would work overtime to keep the Republican Party's official pro-life stance in place. Delegates to the Republican convention in Minneapolis next year will reconsider the party's 93-page platform that opposes abortion and supports President Bush's policy against using tax dollars to fund embryonic stem cell research. The current GOP position on abortion advocates a Human Life Amendment...

The Brody File has come up with a few interesting quotes from Fred Thompson's past. First off, it appears Thompson wasn't a big fan of the GOP having any sort of platform back in 1996. In April of 1996, this is what The Memphis Commercial Appeal wrote: Thompson wants to change the way the 1996 Republican National Convention is conducted. For starters, he wants to abolish the party platform - just toss the archaic thing away. 'It's the most useless device I've ever heard of,' Thompson said during a recent visit to Memphis." Thompson also said this in a separate...

FReepers ALWAYS have what I'm looking for, so I'm sure someone here will in short order. My wife is trying to chip away at her nutjob "Christian" Democrat parents and their life-long addiction to the Democrat Party and she wants a complete set of the GOP and DNC party planks to show them, official ones from websites. We know most of it by heart but that's not the same as an actual referenced copy with source cited. If someone has both that are in basically the same structured layout that would be great. Thanks very much. :)

Republican Party Platform of 1856 This Convention of Delegates, assembled in pursuance of a call addressed to the people of the United States, without regard to past political differences or divisions, who are opposed to the repeal of the Missouri Compromise; to the policy of the present Administration; to the extension of Slavery into Free Territory; in favor of the admission of Kansas as a Free State; of restoring the action of the Federal Government to the principles of Washington and Jefferson; and for the purpose of presenting candidates for the offices of President and Vice- President, do Resolved: That...