The Republican Wing of the Republican Party

Fighting for the soul of the Republican Party.

by Rod D. Martin
August 29, 2002

DENVER – The conservative activists who gathered here earlier this month for the National Federation of Republican Assemblies board meeting look like their party. They are pro-life, pro-gun and pro-Pledge of Allegiance. They think high taxes and big government are bad and that God is good, that Washington should be weak but that America should be strong.

They are a pretty normal bunch of Republicans. And they’re fighting for the soul of their party.

“Anytime the grassroots have a say, we win overwhelmingly,” says Richard Engle, NFRA national director from Oklahoma. “But the liberals want to stop that any way they can.”

Engle is right on both counts. Except in the northeast, the Republican Party’s membership is almost entirely composed of conservatives and their libertarian kin. Assuming they turn out their people, they almost always win at conventions and caucuses, as well as in “closed” primaries (i.e., those primaries where Democrats aren’t allowed to “cr…