The Changing Function of Political Parties

The Republican Party of 2024 belongs to Donald Trump and to MAGA. But the populist right once viewed the GOP very differently. 

At the second annual Conservative Political Action Conference in 1975, attendees debated whether they should junk and replace the GOP. One speaker advocating for the move called parties “no more than instruments, temporary and disposable, by which like-minded citizens can express their views.” The conference passed a resolution declaring that “the question of our allegiance to [the two major] political parties is a matter of increasing doubt to conservatives.”