Birth and Rise of Republican Party

This week is the 164th anniversary of the founding of the Republican Party, one of the oldest functioning political parties in the world. The moment of the creation of what would later be nicknamed the Grand Old Party can be traced back to March 20, 1854 in Ripon, Wisc., where a group of men came together to establish an anti-slavery coalition to meet the growing danger that slavery posed to the country. (Some say that Michigan is actually the birthplace of the Republican Party, and it was there that the first statewide Republican convention took place, but that wasn’t until July 6 of the same year.)