Today's Republican Party opposes big government. It's culturally conservative. Its demographic support is strongest among white voters, and it usually dominates elections in the South.
The party's 2016 presidential nominee has been heavily criticized for inciting racial tensions. But things weren't always this way. Over the past 160 years or so, the party has undergone a remarkable transformation from the party of Abraham Lincoln, To the party of Donald Trump. To understand how the GOP got this way, you have to go back to when it first came into existence, in 1854, just seven years before the Civil War.
There are two parties at this point, the Whigs and the Democrats. America is quickly expanding westward, and there's an intense debate over whether or not new states should permit slavery. The Democratic Party, with strong support in the South, has become increasingly pro-slavery.
But the Whigs are divided on the issue. Their northern supporters are really afraid that the growing number of slave states would have too much political influence, which they feared could really hurt free white workers economically. So in 1854, the country is debating whether or not the territories of Kansas and Nebraska should allow slavery. The Whigs can't agree, and the party ends up collapsing.
The former Whigs in the north form a new party that will fight against letting slavery expand any further. They call it the Republican Party. By 1860, the Republican Party has become increasingly powerful in the North, enough so that a little-known Republican named Abraham Lincoln wins the presidency. Even though Lincoln promises he won't interfere with slavery in states that already have it, he and his party are still too anti-slavery for the South to tolerate.
So 11 Southern states secede from the Union, forming the Confederate States of America. The Northern states decide to fight to keep the Union together. and the Civil War ensues. The result is a northern victory and the abolition of slavery nationwide. After the war, Republicans begin fighting to ensure that recently freed slaves in the South have their rights.
A year after Lincoln's assassination, the party passes the Civil Rights Act of 1866. They fight to make sure that black men have the same right to vote with new laws and constitutional amendments. But something had happened during the Civil War that began changing the young Republican Party. Government spending during the war made many northern businessmen really rich. Gradually, these wealthy financiers and industrialists start taking more and more of a leadership role in the Republican Party. They want to hold on to power, and they don't think that fighting for black rights in a mostly white country is the best way to do that.
Meanwhile, the South is resisting these new racial reforms, often violently. And most white Republican voters and leaders now feel that they've done enough for black citizens in the South. And it's time to emphasize other issues. So in 1870, the party basically gives up on reforming the South, deciding instead to leave it to its own devices. The region becomes politically dominated by white Democrats.
Fast forward to the new century. By the 1920s, the Republican Party has become essentially the party of big business. This works out quite well for them as the economy is booming, but not so well when the economy crashes in 1929. and the Great Depression begins.
Franklin D. Roosevelt and other Democrats are swept into power and begin dramatically expanding the size and role of the federal government in an attempt to fight the Depression and better provide for Americans. Republicans oppose this rapid expansion, defining themselves as opposition to big government, an identity that the party still holds today. Going into the 50s and 60s, race and the South returned to the forefront of national politics, with the civil rights movement attempting to end segregation and ensure blacks truly have the right to vote. The civil rights debate isn't a purely partisan issue.
It's more of a regional issue, with northerners from both parties supporting it and southerners from both parties opposing it. Then, in 1964, it's Democratic President Lyndon Johnson who signs the Civil Rights Act into law. And it's Republican presidential nominee Barry Goldwater who opposes it, arguing that it expands government power too much.
A massive switch-up takes place. Black voters, some of whom had already been shifting from the Republican Party, convert almost entirely to their new advocates, the Democrats. The white voters in the South, who had been staunch Democrats, start to really resent the big government interference here and in other matters like abortion rights and school prayer.
Over the next three decades, whites in the South switch to the GOP, which makes the South an overwhelmingly Republican region. By the 1980s, the party begins to resemble the GOP we are familiar with today. Republicans elect Ronald Reagan, who promises to fight for business interests, lower taxes. and traditional family values. As the 21st century begins, America is going through a major demographic shift in the form of Hispanic immigration, both legal and illegal.
Democrats and business elites tend to support reforming immigration laws so that the over 10 million unauthorized immigrants in the U.S. would get legal status. On the Republican side, tough-on-immigration policies and rhetoric became popular. But this ends up costing the Republicans when, in 2012, Mitt Romney loses his bid for the presidency. He gets blown out among Hispanic voters.
Exit polls showed that 71% of them voted for Barack Obama. So the Republican Party starts to look more like a party for white voters in an increasingly non-white country. Given these demographic trends, Republican leaders worry that if they keep losing Hispanic voters by that much, they'll lose their chances of ever winning the presidency.
So in 2013, some key Republicans in the Senate, including the rising star Marco Rubio, collaborate with Democrats on an immigration reform bill that would give unauthorized immigrants a path to legal status. But there's a huge backlash from the Republican Party's predominantly white base, which views the bill as amnesty for immigrants who broke the rules. This exacerbates the GOP voters'mistrust in their own party leaders, a mistrust that has already been growing for some time. And that makes the political landscape of 2015 fertile ground for a figure like Donald Trump, an outsider businessman who wants to build a wall on the border of Mexico.
Trump isn't a traditional conservative, but he appealed to the resentment and the mistrust of party leaders that Republican primary voters had, as well as the strong opposition to growing immigration trends. And even though he was loathed by party leaders, he won enough support in the primaries to become the GOP nominee for president. So now, the Republican Party is once again at a major crossroads as it tries to meet the political challenges of the 21st century.
It's up to Republican voters and leaders to decide just what they want their party to be.