Some Conservatives Push a ‘Purity Test’ for GOP Candidates
By Peter Wallsten
Conservative Republican Party activists want to withhold money from GOP candidates who stray too far from party orthodoxy.
Ten Republican National Committee members are distributing a plan to impose a purity test – calling for money to be withheld from anyone who disagrees with conservative principles on more than two of 10 core issues.
Among the required stances: oppose President Barack Obama’s health care and cap-and-trade proposals as well as his stimulus plan; reject government funding for abortion; vote “no” on legislation to help unions organize; and support keeping the Defense of Marriage Act.
“The problem is that conservatives have lost trust in the Republican Party that we will govern as conservatives,” said James Bopp Jr., an Indiana lawyer and one of 168 RNC members who will debate the idea during the party’s winter meeting in January. “And I think that loss of trust is warranted to a certain extent because of the fact that we in the final several years of the Bush administration were supporting increased government, earmarks and, ultimately, bailouts.”
Bopp and other conservatives have tried in the past to convince RNC Chairman Michael Steele to label Obama a “socialist.” The new resolution brings back the ‘s’ word, arguing that, “Republican solidarity in opposition to Obama’s socialist agenda is necessary to preserve the security of our country, our economic and political freedoms, and our way of life.”
The resolution underscores a simmering tension within the party about how to remake the GOP and regain power in Washington, coming as conservative candidates such as Florida U.S. Senate candidate Marco Rubio, are challenging establishment Republicans viewed as too accommodating to the left.
Many core conservatives argue that the party has lost elections because it strayed from its ideological foundations, running up deficits during the George W. Bush administration and supporting candidates such as Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, who often sided with Democrats and wound up switching parties. Others, such as Steele, have argued that the party can gain ground by welcoming a wider diversity of viewpoints.
A spokeswoman for Steele, Gail Gitcho, said it was unclear what the chairman would do about the proposal, but she left the door open to negotiations once the deadline for submissions passes in about a month.
“At this point, we do not know what resolutions will be submitted, nor what the final language of any resolution ultimately submitted may be,” Gitcho said.
RNC meetings, traditionally fairly staid affairs focused on mundane rules and convention planning, have become lively in recent years as the party has slipped into minority status. Many committee members are elected by conservative party activists in their home states, and somepushed resolutions in the waning years of the George W. Bush presidency challenging his support for more open immigration laws.
Organizers of the new purity test said they decided to allow deviation on no more than two issues in deference to the mantra of the late President Ronald Reagan, who, as the resolution states, believed “that someone who agreed with him eight out of 10 times was his friend, not his opponent.”
Democrats, who have watched their own support from independent voters slip in recent months as public anxiety has grown over Obama’s push for a health-care overhaul, are likely to use the RNC’s debate to paint the Republicans as inhospitable to centrists. Polls, after all, show that those independents losing faith in Democrats are not necessarily gaining faith in the GOP.
A Democratic Party spokesman, Hari Sevugan, predicted the resolution would “further marginalize” the GOP, and added jokingly: “Do you think they have rules that will allow me to cast a ballot in favor of it?”
The proposal was distributed to a handful of committee members several weeks ago, but surfaced in the blogosphere on Monday. It appears below:
Proposed RNC Resolution on Reagan’s Unity Principle for Support of Candidates
WHEREAS, President Ronald Reagan believed that the Republican Party should support and espouse conservative principles and public policies; and
WHEREAS, President Ronald Reagan also believed the Republican Party should welcome those with diverse views; and
WHEREAS, President Ronald Reagan believed, as a result, that someone who agreed with him 8 out of 10 times was his friend, not his opponent; and
WHEREAS, Republican faithfulness to its conservative principles and public policies and Republican solidarity in opposition to Obama’s socialist agenda is necessary to preserve the security of our country, our economic and political freedoms, and our way of life; and
WHEREAS, Republican faithfulness to its conservative principles and public policies is necessary to restore the trust of the American people in the Republican Party and to lead to Republican electoral victories; and
WHEREAS, the Republican National Committee shares President Ronald Reagan’s belief that the Republican Party should espouse conservative principles and public policies and welcome persons of diverse views; and
WHEREAS, the Republican National Committee desires to implement President Reagan’s Unity Principle for Support of Candidates; and
WHEREAS, in addition to supporting candidates, the Republican National Committee provides financial support for Republican state and local parties for party building and federal election activities, which benefits all candidates and is not affected by this resolution; and
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that the Republican National Committee identifies ten (10) key public policy positions for the 2010 election cycle, which the Republican National Committee expects its public officials and candidates to support:
(1) We support smaller government, smaller national debt, lower deficits and lower taxes by opposing bills like Obama’s “stimulus” bill;
(2) We support market-based health care reform and oppose Obama-style government run healthcare;
(3) We support market-based energy reforms by opposing cap and trade legislation;
(4) We support workers’ right to secret ballot by opposing card check;
(5) We support legal immigration and assimilation into American society by opposing amnesty for illegal immigrants;
(6) We support victory in Iraq and Afghanistan by supporting military-recommended troop surges;
(7) We support containment of Iran and North Korea, particularly effective action to eliminate their nuclear weapons threat;
(8) We support retention of the Defense of Marriage Act;
(9) We support protecting the lives of vulnerable persons by opposing health care rationing, denial of health care and government funding of abortion; and
(10) We support the right to keep and bear arms by opposing government restrictions on gun ownership; and be further
RESOLVED, that a candidate who disagrees with three or more of the above stated public policy positions of the Republican National Committee, as identified by the voting record, public statements and/or signed questionnaire of the candidate, shall not be eligible for financial support and endorsement by the Republican National Committee; and be further
RESOLVED, that upon the approval of this resolution the Republican National Committee shall deliver a copy of this resolution to each of Republican members of Congress, all Republican candidates for Congress, as they become known, and to each Republican state and territorial party office.
Chief Sponsor:
James Bopp Jr., Indiana
Sponsors:
Avie Axdahl, Minnesota
Donna Cain, Oregon
Cindy Costa, South Carolina
Debbie Joslin, Alaska
Peggy Lambert, Tennessee
Carolyn McLarty, Oklahoma
Pete Rickets, Nebraska
Steve Scheffler, Iowa
Helen Van Etten, Kansas
Solomon Yue, Oregon
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2009/1...tes/tab/print/
GOP Purity Test
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