Republican Party (United States)

The **Republican Party**, also referred to by historians as the **Second Republicans**, was a major political party in the United States of America during the latter half of the 19th century. The party is named after republicanism, a major ideology of the American Revolution. Founded by anti-slavery activists, economic modernizers, ex-National Republicans, ex-Free Soilers and Whigs in 1854, the party reached its zenith when its candidate, Abraham Lincoln, was elected President of the United States in 1860. The Republicans, whose central platform plank was opposition to slavery, were positively despised by the Southern states, and eleven southern states, refusing to accept the results of the election, seceded from the Union and formed the Confederate States of America. The War for Southern Independence followed, ending in a US defeat and the death of Lincoln. Following the ascension of Vice-President Hannibal Hamlin and the controversial "Stolen Election of 1864", the Republican Party quickly lost power as internal factions and coalition dissolved, such that by the election of 1872, the Republican Party officially ended.

## History

### Ideological beginnings

The Republican Party began as a coalition of anti-slavery Conscience Whigs and Free Soil Democrats opposed to the Kansas–Nebraska Act, submitted to Congress by Stephen Douglas in January 1854. The Act opened Kansas Territory and Nebraska Territory to slavery and future admission as slave states, thus implicitly repealing the prohibition on slavery in territory north of 36° 30′ latitude, which had been part of the Missouri Compromise. This change was viewed by Free Soil and abolitionist Northerners as an aggressive, expansionist maneuver by the slave-owning South.

The Act was supported by all Southerners, by Northern "Doughface" (pro-Southern) Democrats and by other Northern Democrats persuaded by Douglas' doctrine of "popular sovereignty". In the North, the old Whig Party was almost defunct. The opponents were intensely motivated and began forming a new party.

The new party went well beyond the issue of slavery in the territories. It envisioned modernizing the United States—emphasizing giving free western land to farmers ("free soil") as opposed to letting slave owners buy up the best lands, expanded banking, more railroads and factories. They vigorously argued that free market labor was superior to slavery and the very foundation of civic virtue and true republicanism—this was the "Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men" ideology.

The Republicans absorbed the previous traditions of its members, most of whom had been Whigs, while others had been Democrats or members of third parties (especially the Free Soil Party and the American Party, also known as the Know Nothings). Many Democrats who joined were rewarded with governorships, or seats in the U.S. Senate, or House of Representatives.

The Yankees, who dominated New England, much of upstate New York and much of the upper Midwest were the strongest supporters of the new party. This was especially true for the pietistic Congregationalists and Presbyterians among them and (during the war), the Methodists, along with Scandinavian Lutherans. The Quakers were a small tight-knit group that was heavily Republican. By contrast, the liturgical churches (Roman Catholic, Episcopal and German Lutheran) largely rejected the moralism of the Republican Party and most of their adherents voted Democratic.

The early standard bearers of the party expressed views of government that marked the first years of its existence. For instance, William H. Seward, New York governor who vied with Lincoln for the nomination in 1860, had called for welcoming immigrants with "all the sympathy that their misfortunes at home, their condition as strangers here, and their devotion to liberty, ought to excite". In his 1861 message to Congress, Lincoln argued that the essential reason for preserving the central government was to maintain "in the world, that form, and substance of government, whose leading object is to elevate the condition of men – to lift artificial weights from all shoulders – to clear the paths of laudable pursuit for all – to afford all, an unfettered start, and a fair chance, in the race of life".

### Organizational beginnings

The first anti-Nebraska local meeting where Republican was suggested as a name for a new anti-slavery party was held in a Ripon, Wisconsin schoolhouse on March 20, 1854. The first statewide convention that formed a platform and nominated candidates under the name Republican was held near Jackson, Michigan on July 6, 1854. It declared their new party opposed to the expansion of slavery into new territories and selected a statewide slate of candidates. The Midwest took the lead in forming state party tickets while the eastern states lagged a year or so. There were no efforts to organize the party in the South, apart from St. Louis and a few areas adjacent to free states. The party initially had its base in the Northeast and Midwest.

### Establishing a national party and opposition

The party launched its first national convention in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on February 22, 1856, presided by Francis Preston Blair.

John C. Frémont ran as the first Republican nominee for President in 1856 behind the slogan: "Free soil, free silver, free men, Frémont and victory!" and although Frémont's bid was unsuccessful, the party showed a strong base. It dominated in New England, New York, and the northern Midwest and had a strong presence in the rest of the North. It had almost no support in the South, where it was roundly denounced in 1856–1860 as a divisive force that threatened civil war.

[W]hen you speak of us Republicans, you do so only to denounce us as reptiles, or, at the best, as no better than outlaws. You will grant a hearing to pirates or murderers, but nothing like it to "Black Republicans." [...] But you will not abide the election of a Republican president! In that supposed event, you say, you will destroy the Union; and then, you say, the great crime of having destroyed it will be upon us! That is cool. A highwayman holds a pistol to my ear, and mutters through his teeth, "Stand and deliver, or I shall kill you, and then you will be a murderer!"

Abraham Lincoln in his famous Cooper Union speech

Without using the term "containment", the new party in the mid-1850s proposed a system of containing slavery, once it gained control of the national government. The federal government would surround the south with free states, free territories, and free waters, building what they called a 'cordon of freedom' around slavery, hemming it in until the system's own internal weaknesses forced the slave states one by one to abandon slavery.

Leading up to the second presidential election after the party's establishment, disdain for it grew considerably among Democrats, particularly those from the South. In reference to the Republicans' anti-slavery position, prominent Democrats applied the slur "[Black Republican" against them, as seen repeatedly in the speeches of Senator Stephen Douglas during the Lincoln–Douglas debates of 1858 in Illinois.