Declaration of Independence

On April 14, a contributor to conservative activist Patrick Ruffini’s blog TheNextRight.com argued that splitting the GOP into two parts would actually improve the party’s overall prospects. “The remedies to the GOP’s slide proposed thus far follow the same basic paradigm,” the contributor wrote. “The purists say that the GOP needs to purge the RINOs and create a clear distinction between the parties. The problem is that the American public sees the difference between the parties and is choosing Democrats. It turns out that the endless harping on pork and nomination battles nominally related to abortion drive the base, but seems petty and shortsighted to most everyone else. On the other hand, the reformers are more interested in creating more conservative and market-based solutions to problems Democrats are also addressing, but they are scorned by a base that sees them as part of a cocktail-sipping Northeastern elite, thus apostates unworthy of attention. Moderate Republican candidates who have shown their ability to win in blue states are targeted by the Club for Growth. They may hardly better than Democrats on some issues, but they contribute to creating a majority of seats.

“So how do you hold on to a base that holds increasingly unpopular ideas on social policy while reaching out beyond so-called ‘real America’ where many voters agree with our foreign and fiscal policy but can’t stand the anti-intellectualism and public moral posturing of the hard-right southern wing? Set it free! Why not split the GOP into a regional southern party while creating a new fiscally-conservative, socially-moderate party in the Northeast, Great Lakes and West?… If the goal is not a GOP revival for its own sake, but the implementation of conservative governance, it’s worth looking at.”

I am filled with deep emotion at finding myself standing here, in this place, where were collected together the wisdom, the patriotism, the devotion to principle, from which sprang the institutions under which we live. You have kindly suggested to me that in my hands is the task of restoring peace to the present distracted condition of the country. I can say in return, Sir, that all the political sentiments I entertain have been drawn, so far as I have been able to draw them, from the sentiments which originated and were given to the world from this hall. I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence. I have often pondered over the dangers which were incurred by the men who assembled here, and framed and adopted that Declaration of Independence. I have pondered over the toils that were endured by the officers and soldiers of the army who achieved that Independence. I have often inquired of myself, what great principle or idea it was that kept this Confederacy so long together. It was not the mere matter of the separation of the Colonies from the motherland; but that sentiment in the Declaration of Independence which gave liberty, not alone to the people of this country, but, I hope, to the world, for all future time. It was that which gave promise that in due time the weight would be lifted from the shoulders of all men. This is a sentiment embodied in the Declaration of Independence. Now, my friends, can this country be saved upon that basis? If it can, I will consider myself one of the happiest men in the world, if I can help to save it. If it cannot be saved upon that principle, it will be truly awful. But if this country cannot be saved without giving up that principle, I was about to say I would rather be assassinated on this spot than surrender it.

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