If you read Dwight D. Eisenhower’s brief acceptance speech at the 1952 Republican National Convention, you’ll notice something remarkable. At no point does Eisenhower express a single principle of the Republican Party. He says that he will work to promote the ‘principles and aims of our party’, but he doesn’t say what those principles are. He makes the following observation about the Truman presidency (which was then bogged down in the Korean War):
Our aims—the aims of this Republican crusade—are clear: to sweep from office an administration which has fastened on every one of us the wastefulness, the arrogance and corruption in high places, the heavy burdens and anxieties which are the bitter fruit of a party too long in power.
Much more than this, it is our aim to give to our country a program of progressive policies drawn from our finest Republican traditions; to unite us wherever we have been divided; to strengthen freedom wherever among any group is has been weakened; to build a sure foundation for sound prosperity for all here at home and for a just and sure peace throughout our world.
Ike makes no further criticisms of the Democratic Party, or their policies. He never directly mentions the war. His mandate is vague:
Ladies and Gentlemen, you have summoned me on behalf of millions of your fellow Americans to lead a great crusade—for Freedom in America and Freedom in the world.
But ‘freedom’ is not defined. Whatever motivated rank-and-file Republicans of the time (opposition to the New Deal, alleged communist infiltration, etc.) was glossed or ignored in favor of a promise of ‘progressive policies drawn from our finest Republican traditions.’
It’s no surprise that Adlai Stevenson could say the following in his 1956 acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention.
I will have to confess that the Republican administration has performed a minor miracle — after twenty years of incessant damnation of the New Deal they not only haven’t repealed it but they have swallowed it, or most
of it, and it looks as though they could keep it down at least until after the election.I suppose we should be thankful that they have caught up with the New Deal at last, but what have they done to take advantage of the great
opportunities of these times — a generation after the New Deal?
The Republicans finally won a presidential election in 1952, but they didn’t do it by appealing to their base and they didn’t govern to please their base.
