Republican Party

Founded in 1854 in opposition to slavery expansion, the Republican Party is one of two major political parties in the United States. In the modern era, the Republican Party (aka G.O.P. or “Grand Old Party”) has been viewed publicly as being in support of a philosophy of limited government, libertarian economics, and social conservatism. In conjunction with the demise of the Democratic Party's New Deal Coalition, the Republican Party benefited from a national partisan realignment during the last quarter of the 20th century and, from 1968 to 2004, won 7 of 10 presidential elections. Though traditionally critical of the media's alleged “liberal bias,” Republicans have successfully used mass communications outlets to foment the party's appeal, largely on the basis of patriotism and family values.

The Republican Party's first successful presidential candidate was Abraham Lincoln, who was elected in 1860, despite not having been on the ballot in most Southern states. In the aftermath of the Civil War and Reconstruction, the American South became known as the “Solid South” for its unified opposition to the Republican Party. Nonetheless, Republicans enjoyed great success at the national level throughout the 20th century, though for much of that time it was perceived as a friend of big business and the wealthy at the expense of the working class and poor.

While Democrats such as President Franklin D. Roosevelt pioneered the use of radio as a political tool, Republicans, beginning in the 1950s, took the lead with television. In 1952, Republican presidential candidate Dwight Eisenhower was the first to use television commercials in his campaign. During that same campaign, vice-presidential candidate Richard Nixon, in his famed “Checkers Speech,” became one of the first politicians to appeal directly to the public through television.

The careers and aspirations of Republicans such as Joseph McCarthy in 1954, Barry Goldwater in 1964, and Nixon during the Watergate scandal were adversely affected by negative media coverage and fostered, in some Republican circles, an adversarial relationship with the media. Nonetheless, Republicans such as Ronald Reagan effectively used the media to emote patriotism, hope, and optimism during much of the 1980s while, at the same time, broadening the party's appeal to include libertarians, evangelicals, social conservatives, anticommunists, urban Catholics, disaffected labor, and white Southerners.

In 1994, the Republican Party swept midterm elections and took control of both houses of Congress for the first time since 1952. Many political pundits credited the influence of conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh for that surge in Republican electoral success. During coverage of the 2000 presidential campaign, network news entities began to distinguish the Republican Party from the Democratic Party through a color-coded system in which red represented Republican and blue represented Democrat. The terms red state and blue state have come to connote dichotomies between broadly defined conservative and liberal philosophies and have entered the American lexicon as identifying statements of political values.