On the Republican 'Purity Test'

A group of conservatives on the Republic National Committee are circulating a document they call a RNC Resolution on Reagan's Unity Principle for Support of Candidates and what others are calling a "purity test."

The idea that Republican candidates would support at least eight out of the ten public policy positions expressed in the "RNC Resolution on Reagan's Unity Principle for Support of Candidates" or "purity test" or risk being denied campaign funding and support from the Republican National Committee

Democrats, who have seen a steady slippage of independents from their party, have been quick to try to use the "purity test" to claim that the Republican Party is hostile to independents and centrists. The problem is that the policy positions expressed in the document are not exactly out of the mainstream.

They are:

"(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."

Current polling would suggest that each of the policy positions are very popular with Americans. Republican candidates should not feel put upon being asked to support most or all of them. It would go a long way, in fact, to restoring the confidence of conservatives, which has been slipping as of late, in the Republican Party.

In any event the Democrats are in no position to point fingers at others concerning a "purity test." One can only ask Joe Lieberman, former Democrat and now Independent Senator from the state of Connecticut, who was giving the royal order of the boot from his party for committing the heresy of supporting victory in the War on Terror. The spectacle of arm twisting and leg breaking going on in the Congress to make reluctant Democrats strap on the bomb vest and vote for health care reform has not be very edifying to watch.

The dirty secret is that both political parties try to define themselves in ideological terms. The concept of a "big tent" is very nice and can accommodate a lot of nuance and alternate opinion. But just as one is apparently supposed to be in favor of appeasement abroad and socialism at home to be a Democrat, it should follow that one ought to believe in the opposite if one is a Republican.

In any case, if the Democrats want to try to suggest that small government and low taxes are extreme, then one suspects that conservatives will be more than willing to be thrown in that briar patch.

Source: Some Conservatives Push a 'Purity Test' for GOP Candidates, Peter Wallsten, Wall Street Journal, November 24th, 2009