Questions on the American bourgeois parties of the 19th century

[Stirnerian]

Most of us rightly understand that the central electoral conflict within American politics of the nineteenth century was between a burgeoning industrial-bourgeois order in the North, organized first into the Whig and later into the Republican Parties, and a peculiar alliance of a vestigial Southern planter aristocracy and an incipient Northern populist-proletarian movement in Jackson's Democratic Party.

What fascinates me about this era, however, is the fact that actual political radicalism in the nineteenth century seems largely to have been the provenance of the Republican Party. For all that it represented the interests of the early American capitalists, it was also the Party that many radicals of European descent (i.e. the "48ers") found a political home in after fleeing Europe in the wake of the failures of 1848. Possibly the most famous example is that of Carl Schurz (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Schurz), a Young Hegelian confidante of Marx's and later a general in the Grand Army of the Republic, but a broad swathe of Republican-voting German-American immigrants had been radicalized by their experiences a decade previously.

Nor was this radicalism limited to the German immigrant population. Most famously, the Radical Republican Senator from Massachusetts, Charles Sumner, and the influential Republican abolitionist Horace Greeley were both observers of the International Workingmen's Association (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Workingmen%27s_Association_in_Americ a#Background).

I suppose my questions are, in a certain sense, counterfactual:

1. With the relative prominence of at least ostensibly anti-bourgeois figures and voting blocs within the Republican Party, why did the Democratic Party ultimately become the liberal-populist tribune of the nonradical working class? Would it have been impossible for the worker movement of the time to divorce itself from the Democratic Party and move into the GOP in the mid-late nineteenth century?

In other words, would a political alignment counter to the one we've known since at least the New Deal period (the Republicans as the Party Of Business and the Democrats, at least ostensibly, as the Party of non-radicalized labor and the welfare state) have ever been possible? This possibility seems to have been closed up by 1896 at the latest, though the Fusionist movement in North Carolina seems to have been an attempt to forge something like this. (http://ncpedia.org/fusion-republicans-and-populists)

A natural alignment, to myself, would have had the Republican Party as the organization of bourgeois "progressivism", with the Democratic Party increasingly dominated by the more retrograde elements of capital.

2. When did this early, legitimately Radical Republicanism lose whatever influence it had?

[GiantMonkeyMan]

It's not so strange that radicals were drawn to the traditional capitalist party in the mid 1800's. During this period, there were the famous bourgeois revolutions of 1848 - in this period the revolutionary class was the bourgeoisie that was overturning the old feudal land relations and establishing by force their bourgeois republics. Bourgeois radicalism was virtually dead the world over by the turn of the century as the former revolutionaries became the assumed powers, except in the regions of the world where feudalism still lingered (such as Russia and European colonies).

As for the change in the two parties' positions, firstly the Great Depression and the strategies of Democrat Roosevelt in mitigating the issues attracted elements of the progressive Republicans and alienated the 'Dixiecrats' who eventually split from the party. The Republicans then began their 'southern strategy' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_strategy) in the 60's and 70's after it had become clear the Democrats had subsumed their position as the party of the North. I wouldn't claim to be an expert of this change, however, so I'm not exactly going to go into detail.

[Stirnerian]

Correct, it isn't surprising that they were drawn to it. What I do find surprising was that there was nothing like a concerted effort by these early left-wing Republicans to court workers away from the Democratic Party and into the Republican Party as a mass (to transform it into a reformist liberal Party, like the Democratic Party later) or indeed any real attempt to organize the Republican Party as a cohesive socially liberal organization.

Incidentally, I think that the origins of the "conservatization" of the GOP has deeper roots than the New Deal era. The end of Reconstruction under Rutherford Hayes (http://umich.edu/~lawrace/votetour4.htm) in 1876 (who pulled troops out of the South in order to break a railroad strike) has to be seen as the beginning of it. William McKinley's embrace of the lily-white movement in the South (https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/wfl01), as against the "black and tan" Negro-liberal alliance that had been traditional for the rump Republican Parties of the South until then, could be seen as the second shoe dropping. Finally, the Southern Strategy actually began in 1928, under Herbert Hoover.

I'm loathe to link to it, but Democratic Underground has a collection of New York Times articles detailing this First Southern Strategy:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x2488169

The crux of that issue was Southern Protestant and Klan hostility to the first Catholic Democratic nominee for President, New York Governor Al Smith.

From a letter from Herbert Hoover, November 15, 1928:



11-15: In his letter, Mr. Hoover says he is not at all unmindful of the conditions which for years brought about the political solidarity of the South, an apparent reference to the race question and resentment to the Republican Party's reconstruction policy following the Civil War; but he expresses the belief "that the time has come when in all sections men and women should vote from their convictions as to conditions at the present time and not based on things of former generations."

So the transformation of the Republican Party into the mainline "conservative" Party (within the bourgeois context) had its origins not far removed from the Party's founding. But why was there no concerted opposition to this movement on the part of the reformist Republicans? Why did the less advanced elements of capital not move into the Democratic Party, the more organically conservative organization at the time?

[Stirnerian]

The First "Southern Strategy" (https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://faculty.virginia.edu/jajenkins/conelections.pdf&q=%22rutherford%20hayes%22%20southern%20strategy&ved=0ahUKEwjI4YqVlunLAhUK_mMKHS6zC-QQFggfMAE&usg=AFQjCNEx8X9v3SxZIo_TgP4QNR0ntTMrSQ) (Apologies for the poor formatting of this paper; I'm on a phone.)


OII. The Rise and Fall of the Southern Republicans during Reconstruction

After the Civil War, the Republicans shed their label as a sectional party and emerged as
a true national force. Thanks to a mass of newly enfranchised African-American voters, an“occupying” army of Union troops, and no general amnesty for former-Confederate combatants, the South would quickly become fertile ground for a southern Republican organization. For
example, of the 41 former-Confederate House seats in the 40th Congress (1867-69), thirty-six
were controlled by the Republicans. Shortly thereafter, however, a southern Democratic Party
began to revive, and growing violence toward and intimidation of African-American voters
threatened the electoral process (Trelease 1971; Perman 1984). The Republican-controlled
Congress responded quickly with two reform efforts. First, a series of Enforcement Acts (or
“Force Bills”) was passed to protect the voting rights of African Americans and insure the
sanctity of the electoral process in the South (Gillette 1979: 25-27; Foner 1988: 454-59, 528-
31).17 Second, contested election cases were used to remedy the current electoral situation. In
all, ten apparent Democratic seats in the 41st Congress (1869-71) were either successfully
contested or vacated, based on charges of fraud and corruption, and subsequently became Republican seats.

For the next two Congresses, the 42nd (1871-73) and 43rd (1873-75), the Republicans did not use contested elections as an overt partisan tool, relying instead on the army to oversee southern elections in keeping with the various Enforcement Act provisions. While the Democrats were making steady inroads in the Deep South as well as the Border states, the Republicans downplayed their growing strength, as they still enjoyed unified control of the national government. This was to change very quickly, however, due to two factors.

First, the political context changed: in 1873-74, the Midwest suffered a serious economic depression,
while at the same time the larger northern electorate was becoming disenchanted with Southern Reconstruction and demanding new economic policies. Second, the Union army was slowlybeing withdrawn from the South, leaving African-American voters vulnerable to violence and intimidation.

As a result, the Democrats erupted in the 1874 congressional midterms, dominating the South, winning a majority of seats in the border states, pulling even with the Republicans in the Great Lakes states, and capturing a sizeable number of seats in the northeast (Stewart 1991). In doing so, the Democrats won majority control of the House in the 44th Congress (1875-77). Moreover, in that and the succeeding Congress, the Democrats used the contested election process to their advantage, adding a total of nine seats to their ranks.

Thus, the Republicans found themselves in a position that they had not experienced for
over a decade – as a chamber minority. For a time, the Republicans could afford to discount the
South and any attempts by the Democrats to revive a southern organization, as they could count on a substantial House majority simply by dominating the northern states. However, the Democrats, thanks to their recent successes, had reestablished themselves as a national power.

Consequently, the Republicans had to devise a “southern strategy” if they hoped to vie
consistently for House control (De Santis 1959: 12; Valelly 1995).

The problem was how to make inroads in the South. Many of the strategic tools that Republicans used effectively throughout the late-nineteenth century, like admittance of western states, deployment of Federal election officials, and redistricting, were not effective in maintaining a Republican presence in the post-Reconstruction South. And with Federal troops no longer protecting the ballot box, per the implicit agreement underlying the Compromise of
1877, no credible enforcement mechanisms were in place to ensure fair elections. Contested
election cases, therefore, became the chief means by which the Republicans would fightDemocratic-sanctioned fraud, intimidation, and violence in the South and promulgate hopes that a southern wing of the Republican Party could be resuscitated.

IV. The Post-Reconstruction Southern Strategy

Iniitially, however, it appeared that the new contested-election strategy was finished
before it started. That is, by the 46th Congress (1879-81), the southern component of the
Republican Party was virtually eliminated – only three Republican House seats remained, one
each in Florida, Tennessee, and Virginia. Moreover, a new mobilization and recruitment campaign was attempted, as the liberal element within the Republican Party, led by President Rutherford Hayes, undertook a “new departure” in the South, courting white southern Democrats with Whiggish persuasions while denying patronage to the carpetbaggers, scalawags, and African American who made up the southern Republican rank-and-file (Hirshson 1962: 25-26; Woodward 1966; 22-50; Hoogenboom 1988: 51-78). This strategy of conciliation would prove disastrous: white southerners accepted Hayes’ patronage positions while gleefully rejecting Republican principles, as the “regular” southern Republicans and their local organizations were left to slowly wither away (De Santis 1955, 1959: 99-103, 135-36; Summers 2000: 30-39, 45-45).

Yet, the southern Republican organization was afforded new life, as the Republicans regained control of the House in the 47th Congress (1881-83). And with Hayes now out of the
picture, and the “new departure” policy an unmitigated failure, they labored to keep their
southern pulse alive. Contested elections would be the vehicle, as six southern Democrats – one
each in Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, and Missouri, and two in South Carolina – would beunseated in favor of Republicans. These institutional seat gains provided the Republicans with some leeway in constructing their policy agenda, as they commanded only a bare majority when the House convened, and combined with seven seats captured outright in the general congressional elections – one each in Louisiana and North Carolina, two in Virginia, and three in Tennessee – gave the southern Republican organization newfound hope.

This was not to last, however, as the Democrats would seize control of the House for the
next three Congresses, effectively eliminating election contests as a means to prop up the
fledgling Republican organization in the South. By the late-1880s, the Democrats had completely swept the Republicans from the states of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Texas. The only remaining Republican foothold was in the hill country of eastern Tennessee, western North Carolina, and southwestern Virginia.

The Republicans regained the House in the 51st Congress (1889-91), and with the backing of President Benjamin Harrison and a small group of congressmen sympathetic to the party’s Radical roots, they resumed their southern mission (De Santis 1959: 195-97; Hirshson 1962: 200-14; Welch 1965; Socolofsky and Spetter 1987: 60-65). A new Force Bill would be introduced, this time advocating the Federal courts rather than the army as the guardian of southern elections, and election contests would continue to be wielded as the great “equalizer.”

In all, five Democrats from the former-Confederate South – one each in Alabama, Arkansas,and South Carolina, and two in Virginia – and three Democrats from the former-slave Border states – one from Maryland and two from West Virginia – would be unseated and replaced by Republicans.

After a two-Congress switch in control, the Republicans took back the House in the 54th Congress (1895-97), and their southern efforts continued. Four Democrats from the former-Confederate South – one each from South Carolina and Virginia, and two from Alabama - and two Democrats from the former-slave Border states – Missouri and Kentucky – were unseated in favor of Republicans.

At that point, the Republicans’ use of election contests as a means of securing a southern
base began to slow. Three Democrats from the Deep South in each of the next two Congresses,
the 55th (1897-99) and 56th (1899-1901), were uunseated in favor of Republicans. But while the
Republicans would control the House for the next five Congresses, no additional Democrats from the former-Confederate South would be unseated and replaced by Republicans.

Meanwhile, the Republicans’ electoral success in southern congressional elections left little
doubt that the party’s southern base was essentially dead. Except for occasional Republican successes in eastern Tennessee, southwestern Virginia, and western North Carolina, the South became a one-party Democratic state.

It appears that the Republican Party under Rutherford Hayes got very little in return for its betrayal of the black Freedmen and the white underclass of the South. It is interesting to note that the Party experienced a partial return to its "radical roots"under Benjamin Harrison.

Interestingly, Harrison and the 51st ("Billion Dollar") Congress were attacked along much the same lines as liberal Democrats today (https://www.boundless.com/u-s-history/textbooks/boundless-u-s-history-textbook/the-gilded-age-1870-1900-20/corruption-and-reform-154/republican-reform-under-harrison-827-8836/), for lavish spending in the pursuit of social goals.

What can we take from this? It seems to me that the obvious lesson is that the early Republican Party experienced the same sort of schism between electability-driven "centrists" and stalwart "progressives" the Democratic Party is undergoing today. And if history rhymes at all with the post-Civil War era, the progressives will not win their fight, either.

At any rate, I wish a more experienced Marxist than myself would undertake the analysis of Republican Party factionalism in the post-War era as a project. I'm convinced that understanding this period in particular is the key to unlocking the Southern door that has barred class consciousness among the white proletariat of America. If the rural white working class of the former Confederacy conflates all of modernity with the trauma of Reconstruction - in the process confusing worker ownership of the means of production with centralized statism, say - it might be possible to tailor a revolutionary message to avoid triggering that issue.