The Retreat of the GOP

An elected official from the Northeast flying the GOP banner is a rare sight these days. The defeat of Republicans in the Northeast on Election Day, the Yankee Republicans, as are labeled in this AP report, has spurred commentary regarding the fate of the party in the area.

The defeat of those Republicans has worried some analysts, party supporters, and elected officials, including Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME), who said in the report that the defeat of those like Senator Lincoln Chafee (R-RI) was a "serious reversal."



Is this the inevitable result of the direction that the national party took? Or was it simply the result of the Democratic wave having a greater impact on those Yankee Republicans?

The Yankee Republicans held positions such as keeping the federal spending in check, holding a balanced budget, which are positions held, at least in title, by national Republicans. However, the Yankee Republicans also were for environmental safeguards and held positions on social issues that were more liberal than their national Republican counterparts.

There are several causes for the decline of the Yankee Republicans.

First, the national party has been stressing party loyalty recently, especially to combat the possibility of moderates siding with the Democrats on key votes. The national party's platform is under the control of the more socially conservative Republicans, leaving Yankee Republicans between a rock (or Iraq in Chafee's case) and a hard place. Without "loyalty," support from the national party drops. That situation that the Yankee Republicans find themselves in so often on Capitol Hill is a large cause for the decline of the faction.

Second, which is tied to the first, is that there is little effort at building the party in the Northeast. And why would they? The candidates that would come up would likely be of the Yankee Republican mold after all. And if they recruited candidates that were more in line with the national Republicans, the chances of their success dwindle. Further, if the other state GOP machines did as little as the New York Republican leaders have done building the state party, then it would account for a good portion of the retreat from the Northeast.

Third, the tenuous hold that the Yankee Republicans had in their offices was shattered in the Democratic wave. When voters are looking for a change in leadership, and Yankee Republicans supported the recent congressional leadership. On Election Day, if voters are looking for a change at the top of Capitol Hill, party labeling becomes more important than whether the views of the Yankee Republican up for election are closer to the views of the electorate than not. As such, many of those Yankee Republicans were ousted on Election Day.

Lastly, Democrats have turned to campaigning on a fiscally responsible, more socially liberal, and environmentally strong platforms. The Democrats have spent quite a while trying to get that message out, especially in light of the Republican Congress that has ruled Capitol Hill for the last several years. In doing so, the Democrats have taken space on those platforms away from the Yankee Republicans. And the voters are responding. If a Democrat and a Yankee Republican are closer on issues like these than not, why would those voters support the national Republican leadership by giving their votes to the Yankee Republican?

These causes are all built on one another and the end result is the scattering of the Yankee Republican faction. It is not and will not be extinct, but its potency has been removed.

What will it take for the Yankee Republicans to regain their former territory? It will definitely take a Republican leadership that is more tolerant of the faction's standing within the greater Republican fold.

Or, for a more far-fetched scenario, they can simply become Democrats and join the ranks of Democrats that would be in line with the Yankee Republicans. And for an even more far-fetched scenario, those Yankee Republicans could become a cornerstone for the Northeast portion of a greater Centrist Party.

It looks like the Yankee Republicans are going to be in the political wilderness for at least a little while. It might be the Republican version of the scattering of the Dixiecrats. Regardless of comparisons, the defeat of the Yankee Republicans may just be a sign of the partisan wars dominating national politics right now. If the newly-elected Democrats follow through on their plans for bipartisan governing, then they may have lost a good portion of the Republicans that would work with them more often than not.