Do Republicans Need a Bad Godesberg?

Looking at the current crop of Republican presidential candidates one has to wonder what Louisville basketball coach Rick Pitino must be thinking. While coaching the Boston Celtics, Pitino gave a rather infamous press conference where he told fans that Celtic greats Larry Bird, Kevin McHale, and Robert Parish were “not walking through that door,” and if they did “they’re going to be gray and old.” Much to the dismay of my fellow conservatives, Ronald Reagan is not walking through the door of the Republican National Convention in a year and a half, and Barry Goldwater isn’t walking through that door. In fact, if things continue as they are, it doesn’t look like Newt Gingrich is going to walk through that door either.

The fundamental question then is what kind of party we Republicans really want this election season. Indeed, the factionalism that many were warning about after the 2004 election consumed the party by the time the midterms rolled around last November. Today fiscal conservatives, traditional fundamentalists, moderates, libertarians, and conservatives of the “neo” and “paleo” variety all want something different from the Republican Party. This problem becomes all the more complex when you consider the current frontrunner for the 2008 nomination is pro-choice, pro-gay rights, and pro-gun control. On the opposite side of things, the one candidate whose unrelenting social conservatism no one doubts is himself failing to attract any attention at all.

Perhaps then it would be easier for Republicans to simply abandon the baggage of being an explicitly anti-abortion, anti-gay marriage party supposedly held hostage by the Christian Right. It is indeed possible to defend traditional American values without running on issues that might get 40% support on a good day. Requiring able-bodied welfare recipients to work, putting America’s interests before those of an international organization, and requiring all American citizens to learn English are just a few issues on which at least seven in ten Americans agree. I dare say most Americans are sick and tired of hearing about abortion and gay marriage. I know I am. In fact, I personally am calling upon my readers to give the first Republican candidate who mentions “defending traditional marriage” a swift kick to the gonads.

In 1959 at the Bad Godesberg Conference, the Social Democratic Party of Germany, plagued by a series of defeats at the ballot box, finally abandoned the explicitly Marxist elements of its platform that had scared and driven away potential voters for so many years. What resulted was a moderate party of the center-left that won four out of the next six German elections. In 1995, Tony Blair brought the Labour Party to the center kicking and screaming by re-writing Clause IV of the party constitution which had pledged to nationalize the means of production. The rest, as they say, is history, with Blair and "New Labour" in the middle of an unprecedented third term in office.

The lessons of these shifts in party policy show that by ditching divisive elements of the platform a party can still win elections and stay connected with key groups on more important issues. In 2006, the Republicans overemphasized abortion and gay marriage out of desperation since it had nowhere else to turn and nothing else on which to run. The result was clear enough with Karl Rove’s get-out-the-vote strategy falling short and moderate voters fleeing to the Democrats. Overemphasizing divisive social issues elected Bill Clinton twice (I still don’t know what we were thinking when Pat Robertson was made a keynote speaker at the ’92 Convention) and, of course, Queen Nancy. With that in mind, perhaps it would be best to forget about banging the abortion and gay marriage drums for a while and recommit the Republican Party to fiscal responsibility, a leaner federal government, a coherent and common sense immigration strategy, and a redoubling of our effort to win the war against radical Islam. Truly these are issues that can unite the party and carry us to victory.