Who Needs Enemies? The Tea Party Impact on the Republican Party
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Who Needs Enemies?
The Tea Party Impact on the Republican Party
Paper Presented to the 2013 State of the Parties Conference
Akron, Ohio
November 7, 2013
This version is a draft and comments welcome.
Please do not cite this paper without the permission of the authors.
William J. Miller
Director of Institutional Research and Effectiveness
Flagler College
wmiller@flagler.edu
Michael John Burton
Associate Professor of Political Science
Ohio University
burtonm@ohio.eduWho Needs Enemies?
The Tea Party Impact on the Republican Party
William J. Miller
Michael John Burton
ABSTRACT
This paper argues that the Tea Party’s deep intellectual roots and critical strategic
position give the movement staying power. After CNBC’s Rick Santelli called for a Tea
Party on the banks of Lake Michigan in 2009, most pundits believed the resulting
movement would be short-lived. Tea Party supporters were viewed as political outliers
with little chance of long-term relevance. After a series of successful primary and
general election campaigns in 2010, many Americans felt the Tea Party was more show
than substance. Yet the Tea Party has survived a string of defeats. This paper argues that
a particularized conception of “constitutional liberty” both unites and divides the
Republican Party. To the extent that Tea Party activists see value in differentiating
themselves from pragmatists, and to the extent that libertarians and traditionalists can
find common ground under a unifying ideal, the Tea Party movement will pose a serious
challenge to the more pragmatic players of the GOP.
INTRODUCTION
In the aftermath of the government shutdown and near debt-default of October
2013, some mainstream Republicans criticized the brinksmanship of Tea Party
legislators. 1 Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell announced, “There won’t be
another government shutdown—you can count on that.” 2 When the president of the U.S.
Chamber of Commerce was asked about Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, the seeming
architect of the failed shutdown-default scheme, the representative of the business
1community offered strategic advice: “If you’re going to rush the net all the time, you
better have a lot of motion to the left and right. [Cruz] hasn’t proved that to me yet.” 3
Back home, Cruz was unrepentant. Returning to address his fellow Texans, Cruz
received an eight-minute standing ovation and then commenced lashing out at
Washington politics and colleagues in the United States Senate. 4
The applause was coming from voters in a state where support for repeal of the
Seventeenth Amendment—that is, returning the selection of U.S. senators to state
legislatures—had “become an article of faith among many on the right.” 5 To Washington
Post blogger Jonathan Bernstein, the drive to repeal the amendment epitomized a bidding
war inside the Republican Party: “[T]he key thing within the GOP isn’t ‘establishment’
vs. ‘tea party,’ but a general, party-wide obsession with being a True Conservative in a
party where pretty much every party actor agrees on matters of ideology and on specific
issues of public policy.” 6 To Bernstein, Republicans were caught in a programmatic
spiral, “[a] constant search among radicals for ideas that can separate them from everyone
else (and thus prove the radicals to be the True Conservatives), along with rapid adoption
of those idea by everyone else.” 7 Cruz was disappointed with some leaders in his party:
“I think it was unfortunate that you saw multiple members of the Senate Republicans
going on television attacking House conservatives, attacking the effort to defund
Obamacare, saying it cannot win, it’s a fool’s errand, we will lose, this must fail. That is
a recipe for losing the fight, and it’s a shame.” 8
There are limits to the bidding, as reactions from McConnell and business
pragmatists attest, but differentiation from mainstream politics seems to be a core value
of Tea Party activism. Some in the established GOP party structure may hope the
activism will fade, but a close examination of the movement’s historical development, its
conception of constitutional liberty, and its strategic situation vis-à-vis mainstream
Republicanism shows ample opportunity for endurance. Indeed, the Tea Party’s merger
of conservative libertarianism and conservative traditionalism has deep roots in the party
2shaped by President Ronald Reagan in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. Its ideological soul
embraces a wide range of contemporary issues. When the movement’s libertarian and
traditional wings align against the mainstream of the GOP, they can be a powerful force.
Like it or not, the Tea Party wields power.
Scholars have explained the movement’s rise and durability by way of latent racial
tension, elite funding, increasing partisan polarization, and a merger of social movements
representing the New Right, Christian Right, and conservative populism. 9 A central
theme of the scholarly literature on the Tea Party movement is that did it not arise from
pure spontaneity, but rather that it is rooted in a well-travelled social, political, and
ideological terrain.
This paper will argue that the Tea Party’s deep intellectual roots and critical
strategic position give the movement staying power. The history of contemporary
conservatism is understood as the interplay of three intellectual strands——which are
now joined in a quest for constitutional liberty. Ted Cruz, Rick Santorum, Ron Paul, the
Tea Party groups FreedomWorks and Tea Party Patriots, and others affiliated with the
Tea Party have used the term to present an understanding of conservative values today.
By this ideal, the Constitution gives a moral foundation and orderly framework that
fosters personal sovereignty and religious liberty while avoiding indulgent
permissiveness. 10 This paper endeavors to trace the contours of “constitutional liberty”
and show how the ideal can both unite and divide the Republican Party.
Alan Abramowitz noted in 2011 that the rise of the Tea Party coincided with
growing polarization in the electorate and growing conservative activism in the GOP. 11
There is broad consensus that the political center has been receding for the past two or
three decades. 12 Gary Jacobson also found a Tea Party filled with strong conservatives. 13
This paper attends to the consequences of that shift. To the extent that Tea Party activists
see value in differentiating themselves from pragmatists, and to the extent that
libertarians and traditionalists can find common ground under an ideal like constitutional
3liberty, the Tea Party movement will continue to pose a serious challenge to the
pragmatic wing of the GOP. The Tea Party gains little traction when it is divided—either
between libertarians and traditionalists or within these two groups—but when the Tea
Party gathers behind a united front, the combined force of libertarianism and
traditionalism can effectively challenge pragmatic thinking in the Republican Party.
There is little reason to believe this dynamic will change in the near future.
HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT
An observer of contemporary American conservatism would not have been
surprised by the final days of the 2012 Republican primary season, as a pragmatic
Republican was fighting off candidates representing the traditionalist and libertarian
strands of the Tea Party movement. While Mitt Romney had frequently been criticized
for adjusting his convictions according to political necessity, Rick Santorum’s fervent
traditionalism and Ron Paul’s uncompromising libertarianism combined to articulate
tensions within the Republican Party that began with Robert A. Taft’s rejection of the
New Deal and continued through William Buckley’s call for personal virtue and Barry
Goldwater’s appeal to a Western-style individualism. Potentially disparate ideological
threads were neatly braided by Ronald Reagan in his 1964 defense of conservative
principles and Richard Nixon’s pursuit of a “Southern Strategy.” By the time of
Reagan’s first inauguration in 1981, the separate strands of conservatism seemed
inseparable.
Contemporary Conservatism
Actor-turned-activist Ronald Reagan was delivering conservatism to audiences
nationwide long before his unapologetic 1964 speech, “A Time for Choosing,” was
4broadcast in support of Goldwater’s bid for the White House. Reagan merged ideals of
economic freedom and personal liberty into a vision of constitutional order. “The
Founding Fathers,” Reagan argued, “knew a government can’t control the economy
without controlling people. And they knew when a government sets out to do that, it
must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose.” 14 “The Speech,” as Reagan’s “Time
for Choosing” came to be called, was studded with facts and contained flashes of humor,
and it was styled with a fast cadence and uncompromising language, making clear that
government must change radically and immediately. Urgency led Reagan to invoke “Mr.
Democrat himself, Al Smith, the great American, [who] came before the American
people and charged that the leadership of his Party was taking the Party of Jefferson,
Jackson, and Cleveland down the road under the banners of Marx, Lenin, and Stalin.” 15
In retrospect, Reagan’s speech is notable for its inattention to religiosity. The
conservatism of 1964 was largely defined by opposition to government programs and to
communists. Goldwater focused on individual freedom while readers of Ayn Rand
attended to capitalist individualism. But some conservatives, like those given voice in
Buckley’s National Review, argued that American politics should be premised on
individual virtue. Capitalism should rest on moral principles. Hippie counter-culture,
drug abuse, urban riots, and open-market pornography, as well as the emergence of an
anti-war movement and New Left, all fueled support for Richard Nixon’s 1968
presidential bid and ultimately for the fusion of moral virtue and economic individualism
in the conservative mind.
Nixon won the White House eight years after his loss to John F. Kennedy and four
years after Lyndon Johnson’s rout of Goldwater. Nixon would restore “law and order” to
the nation. Just 43.4 percent of the vote went to Nixon, as opposed to 42.7 for Hubert
Humphrey. The balance went to a conservative Democrat, George Wallace, now running
under the banner of the American Independent Party with backing from a wide swath of
white voters in the Deep South. Having seen the bulk of their Democratic Party support
5desegregation, the Civil Rights Act, and the Voting Rights Act, conservative southern
Democrats had become unbound from their party ties. Nixon saw opportunity and
augmented his appeal to pragmatists with nods toward traditionally southern policies like
states’ rights. In 1972, he won every state in the Union except Massachusetts on a
centrist platform that paid heed to conservative values.
After Nixon’s resignation and into the one-term presidency of Jimmy Carter,
Ronald Reagan challenged the GOP establishment. Within the Republican Party, battle
lines had been drawn between the followers of New York Governor, later Vice President
to Gerald Ford, Nelson Rockefeller, who could be counted as social liberals, and their
conservative adversaries, who were energized by the Supreme Court’s ruling in Roe v.
Wade (1973). For the 1976 election, Ford abandoned Rockefeller in favor of the
conservative Senator from Kansas, Bob Dole. And Roe gave traditionalists a new
rallying point. Although Governor Reagan had signed legislation that liberalized
restrictive abortion laws in California, he was now viewed as a social conservative
espousing economic freedom. Reagan challenged Ford in 1976, and lost, then Carter in
1980, and won.
Upon being sworn into office, Reagan intoned, “We are a nation under God, and I
believe God intended for us to be free. It would be fitting and good, I think, if on each
Inauguration Day in future years it should be declared a day of prayer.” 16 For those
skeptical of public intervention, Reagan offered a constitutional lesson: “Our
Government has no power except that granted it by the people. It is time to check and
reverse the growth of government which shows signs of having grown beyond the
consent of the governed.” 17 Or more practically, “[G]overnment is not the solution to our
18
problem; government is the problem.” Reagan thereby unified pragmatism,
traditionalism, and libertarianism. While his presidency was more pragmatic than many
conservatives would later remember, Reagan’s personal standing could hold the disparate
groups together throughout most of his eight-year tenure.
6Afterwards, the Reagan Coalition would be strained. Although Reagan’s Vice
President, George H.W. Bush, handily defeated Governor Michael Dukakis in 1988, he
would face conservative Pat Buchanan in 1992. The conservative opposition weakened
Bush in the run-up to a general election that pitted him against Arkansas Governor Bill
Clinton and business magnate Ross Perot. Perot’s Reform Party rallied supporters
around fiscal issues like the federal debt and deficit. Perot was drawing from Clinton
voters who wanted change, but from Bush he was stealing voters who were committed to
a core Republican position, fiscal responsibility.
If the Grand Old Party did not stand for fiscal responsibility, it was losing on an
existential issue. Over the course of Clinton’s presidency, a $290 billion per year deficit
was transformed into a $236 billion per year surplus. President George W. Bush looked
like a conservative on national security and federal taxation, but by the end of his two-
terms in office the yearly federal deficit had ballooned to $459 billion. In 2008, Congress
passed and President Bush signed a $700 trillion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).
While economists might be in rough agreement that TARP was necessary, the perception
among many conservatives was that a Republican president had failed to keep the size
and reach of government in check. Barack Obama handily defeated John McCain while
the nation descended into a “Great Recession,” and many Republicans assumed the new
Democratic president would indulge a liberal appetite for taxing and spending. There
was no guarantee that Republican pragmatists could staunch the bleeding.
After the 2008 election, the three strands of American conservatism were out of
alignment. Tax cuts, military spending, Medicare expansion, and TARP undermined the
GOP’s position as the party of fiscal responsibility. It was a critical problem.
Pragmatists, traditionalists, and libertarians frequently disagreed on tactics, strategies,
and ideals, but all were united on the question of debt and deficit. Electoral defeat was
hitting at the same moment as the GOP theory of economic growth seemed by discredited
by a crashing stock market, frozen currency markets. Jobs were being shed by the
7hundreds of thousands each month. Many Republicans wanted, or demanded, radical
change. Moreover, virtually the entire leadership of the Republican Party was implicated
in government spending and many GOP legislators had voted for TARP, putting them in
league with President Bush, his Treasury Secretary, and Democratic leaders in Congress.
“Washington” seemed wholly opposed to the shared conservative ideal of fiscal
responsibility.
The Tea Party in the GOP
Recent Democratic victories in presidential elections have accelerated organized
challenges from the conservative right. The ultra-conservative John Birch Society,
established in 1958, took off in the early 1960s. Johnson’s landslide energized Southern
Democrats, leading to George Wallace’s Independent Party. Jimmy Carter’s presidency
saw a string of victories by Phyllis Stop ERA and the establishment of Moral Majority
by Jerry Falwell and Paul Weyrich, along with the rise of the Chicago School of neo-
classical economics and conservative think tanks. Bill Clinton’s victory in 1992 was
followed by the scandal-minded Arkansas Project, and later, more importantly, Fox News
Channel and talk radio. Conservative media outlets, according to Skocpol and
Williamson, influence the national news agenda when they “sponsor incessant polls that
reinforce controversial narratives by repeating hot-button issues and turning them into
questions.” 19 The stories can then circulate among conservatives even when there is no
effective central authority keeping activists on message. Conservative media like Fox
effectively plays the coordinating role.
Other influential conservative voices can be found on the financial news network
CNBC. In 2009, live from the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, with traders
applauding his words, CNBC’s Rick Santelli railed against a Democratic plan to infuse
the ailing housing market with new cash and new regulations. He easily mixed the
8rhetoric of economic responsibility with broader conservative themes. He asked the
traders, “How many of you people want to pay for your neighbors’ mortgage that has an
extra bathroom and can’t pay their bills? Raise their hand. [Traders boo.] President
Obama, are you listening?” Santelli lampooned modern macro-economic theory (“The
government should spend a trillion dollars an hour because we’ll get $1.5 trillion back”),
evoked fears of communism (“Y’know, Cuba used to have mansions and a relatively
decent economy. They moved from the individual to the collective. Now they’re driving
‘54 Chevys”), played on anti-government sentiments (“The last place I’m ever going to
live or work is DC”), and evoked the Framers (“if you read our Founding Fathers, people
like Benjamin Franklin and Jefferson, what we’re doing in this country now is making
them roll over in their graves.”) In the midst of his rant, Santelli shouted, “We’re
thinking of having a Chicago Tea Party in July. All you capitalists that want to show up
to Lake Michigan, I’m going to start organizing.”
The new Tea Party movement was frequently viewed as a flash-in-the-pan
comprising angry, uneducated, Americans who were pounding on government in hopes
of shaking off personal tax burdens. 20 But an April 2010 New York Times/CBS News
survey showed that many Tea Party supporters were highly educated, high-income
Americans who had become dissatisfied with American politics. “Tea Party” quickly
became a preferred label for oppositionists who believed the mainstream of the GOP
could not effectively stand up to an out-of-control government dominated by a
Democratic president, Democratic House of Representatives, and Democratic Senate.
The resulting movement was an unwieldy, sometimes disparate, assemblage of
complaints, programs, and political groups. Libertarians who had pinned their hopes on
the 2008 presidential candidacy of Congressman Ron Paul of Texas could now cheer on
Paul’s son Rand, soon to be the Senator from Kentucky. Traditionalists could look to
Alaska Governor and former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin along with
Congresswoman Michele Bachmann of Minnesota. For traditionalists and libertarians
9alike, pushing back against Washington often meant vocal separation from Republican
pragmatists, making political differentiation a key element of the Tea Party identity.
Tea Party groups were established across the country. In some places, rival
organizations were claiming the mantle. National Public Radio’s This American Life
profiled two life-long friends who found their relationship strained by their support of
opposing Tea Party candidates in Michigan. Jason Jones of The Daily Show had fun with
a member of the North Central Ohio Tea Party Patriots, which had split from the
Mansfield [Ohio] Tea Party Patriots because the latter group “only wanted to focus on
fiscal responsibility and taxes, but our Founding Fathers were influenced by God, and
that’s why I thought it should be a part of our Tea Party.” As their movement was being
dismissed by mainstream pundits, Tea Party candidates started running for high-level
elective office, often against party insiders and even incumbents. (At the 2009 State of
the Parties conference, Robert Boatright discussed a new phenomenon in contemporary
politics: Getting “primaried.” 21) The 2010 election cycle saw the election of Tea Party
candidates like Marco Rubio (U.S. Senate, Florida, primary and general), Rand Paul
(Kentucky, U.S. Senate, primary and general), Christine O’Donnell (Delaware, U.S.
Senate, primary), Sharron Angle (Nevada, U.S. Senate, primary), Joe Miller (Alaska,
U.S. Senate, primary), Mike Lee (Utah, U.S. Senate, caucus and general), Niki Haley
(South Carolina, Governor, primary and general), Jim DeMint (South Carolina, U.S.
Senate, primary and general), Tom Emmer (Minnesota, Governor, primary), Paul LePage
(Maine, Governor, primary and general), and Rick Perry (Texas, Governor, primary and
general).
The GOP victories of the 2010 electoral cycle saw Republicans take control the
House of Representatives after four years in the minority, netting 64 seats. In the Senate
they netted six. Republicans made substantial gains in the states. Despite their
differences, traditionalists and libertarians worked with pragmatists in the battle against
the Democrats.
10There is genuine affinity between the Tea Party movement and pragmatic
conservatism. Traditionalists and libertarians are united in their opposition to taxes,
public regulation, and government spending. Moreover, the marriage between Tea Party
adherents and centrists in the GOP is prompted by the exigencies of electoral politics: In
American-style winner-take-all elections, mainstreamers need to build majorities and
movement activists need to join with centrists, lest the mainstream politicians lose
elections or the movement’s activists lose relevance. The question for the Tea Party
movement is, How much principle should be compromised? If the movement concedes
too much, it wins elections at the cost of its ideals; but then, if the movement pushes its
own agenda too hard, it will not win. The Tea Party has shown greater resilience than
Ross Perot’s Reform Party largely because it has been able to balance principle and
pragmatism. And this balance, in turn, owes not only to success in building
organizational alliances, but also a robust, unifying understanding of constitutional
liberty.
CONSTITUTIONAL LIBERTY
American conservatism has a complex history. It involves the economy, race
relations, religion, financial resources, activist groups, constituencies, demographics,
immigration, geography, political strategy, and a range of other factors including
ideology. And ideology itself is complicated. Scholars would be hard-pressed to define a
pure form of pragmatism, traditionalism, or libertarianism, but there are minimal criteria.
Traditionalism reveres the past and tries to retain the best of what is old even as it
accepts something new; libertarianism espouses the primacy of individual choice; and
while pragmatism may start with a guiding vision of society, it sees politics as the art of
the possible and is willing to compromise. Political players are rarely, if ever, definable
by any single strand, and a key difference between the traditionalism and libertarianism
11of the Tea Party and the pragmatism of centrists lies in a simple willingness to accept
partial victory. A pragmatic legislative leader surely has ideals he would never trade
away; libertarians have conceptions of right and wrong; and most traditionalists generally
respect a person’s freely chosen actions. While a chronicle of American conservatism
that simplifies history to three strands simplifies the story, it can highlight important
aspects of American conservatism.
Ideological tensions within the Tea Party movement were visible in 2010. An
“exit poll” conducted at an April “Tax Day Rally” in Washington, DC, showed a distinct
split between libertarians and traditionalists—between Tea Party activists who were
deeply concerned about abortion and gay marriage and those in the crowd who conveyed
less worry. 22 Those who expressed deep concern looked up to former Governor Sarah
Palin while others admired Congressman Ron Paul. 23 One measure of the Tea Party’s
resilience is its success in mustering diverse priorities under a robust ideology that can
resolve seeming contradictions.
Santelli could have focused his rant on the immediate financial implications of
government intervention in the housing market. Instead, he broadened his rant to link the
cash infusion and bureaucratic regulation to the unfairness of redistributing wealth from
responsible people to the irresponsible, the Framers’ intentions, and Keynesian
economics. If the heart of the Tea Party movement was narrowly focused on the
economy, it should have withered as the economy improved. Instead, it has gone on to
embrace a wide range of issues, including the use of unmanned aircraft for military
purposes and concerns about electronic surveillance, as well as immigration, abortion,
and same-sex marriage. While some liberals may claim the movement is simply nativist,
self-centered, racially influenced, or well-funded by dark forces, the success of the Tea
Party may also be explained by the fact that its ideology has been tested and refined over
decades of intellectual evolution.
12In their most extreme forms, traditionalism and libertarianism tend toward
diametric opposition, with autarchy countering anarchy and vice versa. But the American
style of conservatism generally does not take to the extremes. Indeed, the way in which
each strand has found to accommodate the other is not a simple balancing act that seeks
equal parts of both strands. It is a multidimensional effort at achieving mutual
reinforcement.
The relationship between traditionalism and libertarianism generally follows the
blueprint laid down by Reagan-style conservatism. Families and markets enjoy a
symbiotic relationship whereby conventional domestic relations raise children to be good
and productive citizens, and those citizens, once they enter the private sector, become
part of an economic engine that allows breadwinners to provide for their families.
Government has a place at the margins, but for the most part the public sector—
especially the national government—must simply get out of the way. Government
powers to tax, spend, regulate, and incur debt ought to be limited. Families, on the other
hand, should be left free to follow their dreams. Federal authorities should not tell people
how to spend their hard-earned money (or whether they should own guns). The role of
government, in this view, is restricted to protecting national security, private property,
human life (including the lives of “the unborn”), and individual liberty.
Opposition to abortion has been an important conservative principle since the
Supreme Court announced its decision in Roe v. Wade. Presumably, libertarians could
view any regulation on abortion as depriving an individual of free choice. In fact, the
Court’s majority in Roe found a right to choose an abortion in a constitutional “right of
privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment’s concept of personal
liberty [or] in the Ninth Amendment’s reservation of rights to the people.” The abortion
question, if not properly managed, threatens the relationship between libertarianism and
traditionalism.
13As it turns out, conservative libertarianism can reinforce traditionalism. Because
life is a gift from God, and the Constitution, inspired by the Creator, protects the “right to
life,” the “right to choose” does not include the right to choose an abortion.
Libertarianism is therefore pro-life. RonPaul.com cites an appearance by Paul on
“Hannity and Colmes”: “[I]f you can’t protect life, how can you protect liberty?” 24 Paul
Ryan has framed the abortion issue as a small-government question: President Obama’s
defense of “Big Government” comes from “a politician who has never once lifted a hand
to defend the most helpless and innocent of all human beings: the child waiting to be
born.” 25 Same-sex marriage and other matters of sexuality can be framed in terms of
religious liberty. If government-run schools provide sex education or if minors can
access abortion services without parental consent, a traditionalist can see a violation of a
family’s “religious liberty.” Rejection of same-sex marriage can also be justified on
libertarian terms. Conservative media have frequently reported on presumed religious-
liberty violations suffered by small businesses such as flower shops that decline to serve
weddings held for non-heterosexual couples. 26
Similarly, liberty can be defended as a form of traditionalism. Tea Party
supporters who want a scholarly perspective can read Tea Party Catholic: The Catholic
Case for Limited Government, a Free Economy, and Human Flourishing. 27 Reacting to a
liberal Christian critique of Tea Party libertarianism, Jay Richards, author of Money,
Greed, and God: Why Capitalism is the Solution and Not the Problem, 28 contributed his
view in an American Enterprise Institute blog: “The universality of human sin is one of
the best arguments in favor of a free market, which is one of the best checks on extreme
concentrations of power and is perhaps the best way we’ve discovered of channeling
human sinfulness into socially beneficial outcomes.” 29 The full text of Richards’ article
was reprinted as a discussion on FreeRepublic.org. 30 For traditionalists, biblical passages
can even defend cuts to social programs like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance
Program (SNAP). Congressman Stephen Fincher of Tennessee has explained that “The
role of citizens, of Christians, of humanity is to take care of each other, but not for
14Washington to steal from those in the country and give to others in the country.” 31
Fincher was drawing from a line of thinking that saw Jesus Christ blessing the charity of
citizens as opposed to the paternalism of government. 32
As Skocpol and Williamson have noted, government assistance becomes improper
redistribution when it goes to the wrong people. The oft-ridiculed slogan, “Government
keep your hands off my Medicare” makes sense when Medicare is viewed as a benefit
earned by hard work, just as retirees spent their working lives paying into the system
before drawing Social Security checks. 33 The intense reaction to Senator Obama’s
campaign remark to “Joe the Plumber” that government should “spread the wealth
around” can be understood if “makers and takers” are pitted against each other. Mitt
Romney made the “47 percent” famous in 2012: They “are dependent upon government,
who believe that they are victims, who believe that government has a responsibility to
care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you
name it.” 34 The 47 percent had been a topic of conversation for years. Fox News
commentator Neil Cavuto had declared in April 2010 that “the portion of American
households footing the bill is actually about half. That’s right. 47 percent of households,
largely those with incomes around 50 grand and under, paying no taxes but are the
overwhelming beneficiaries of all of these [sic] spending.” 35 From the Tea Party
perspective, wealth is earned as a matter of moral right, and at any rate collectivist
economies interrupt the economic mechanisms of moral hazard that produce wealth in the
first place.
This is not to say that the marriage of libertarianism and traditionalism is always
harmonious. The “Contract from America,” developed with help from FreedomWorks,
protested liberal tax and energy policy but made no mention of abortion and other
socially conservative issues. Indiana Congressman Mike Pence in 2010 warned, “Those
who would have us ignore the battle being fought over life, marriage and religious liberty
have forgotten the lessons of history…America’s darkest moments have come when
15economic arguments trumped moral principles.” 36 Still, traditionalists and libertarians
can often find common cause, as when the Affordable Care Act raised concerns that the
federal government would start paying for abortions. And some conservatives, like Rick
Santorum, have picked their battles: “When I talk about cultural issues today, I don’t
generally talk about abortion. The real issue of life right now is Obamacare and the
rationing of treatment to those on the margins of society.” 37
Originally, the Tea Party message seemed tightly focused on taxes, spending,
government regulation, debt, and deficit. The “Tea” in “Tea Party” was understood by
many activists to stand for “Taxed Enough Already.” But from the beginning, the fiscal
issues pressed by the Tea Party were wrapped in larger issues rooted in conservative
traditionalism and conservative libertarianism. Not a Johnny-one-note that falls from
view after a season of protest, the Tea Party movement has proven its durability over time
and has found ways to articulate ideological connections across a wide range of political
issues, even where outside observers might see internal contradiction. A robust vision of
American society enhances the Tea Party movement’s capacity to work in a multiplicity
of arenas, especially when traditionalists, libertarians, and pragmatists can find common
ground.
CONVERGENCE AND DIVERGENCE
In a time of polarized partisanship, Republican Party identification has become a
question of intensity and direction, as opposed to cross-pressured choice. While some
Republicans may see themselves as being closer to Ron Paul or Rick Santorum, or closer
to Mitch McConnell or Mitt Romney than either Paul or Santorum, the Republican Party
is unified against the Democratic Party in ways not otherwise seen in contemporary
politics. The influence of the GOP therefore rests with the capacity of ideological
partners to find common ground. When pragmatists, traditionalists, and libertarians
16agree, the party is a powerful force; when one of the blocs is an outlier, the influence of
the party is diluted; and when pragmatism is opposed by a combination of traditionalists
and libertarians, the impact of the Tea Party movement on the pragmatic elements of the
Republican Party is deeply felt, as witness the acrimonious debates on budget priorities
and federal spending of 2013.
Scenario 1: Shared Values
Perhaps no single issue has more successfully galvanized the Republican Party in
the last five years than the Affordable Care Act (ACA), or “Obamacare.” Traditionalists,
libertarians, and pragmatists have strongly opposed President Obama’s efforts to reform
health care coverage in the United States. 38 For libertarians, the ACA represents a the
federal government regulating the lives of individual citizens and intruding in the private
markets; traditionalists see health care reform overstepping moral boundaries by covering
birth control and abortion procedures; and pragmatists saw the potential for cost increases
and the of existing health insurance policies. And, in a larger sense, Republicans are
unified in stopping Obama’s legislative agenda. If the ACA could be defeated in the
legislative process or afterwards, all three segments of the GOP would win, even as
traditionalism, pragmatism, and libertarianism could provide differing rationales. Indeed,
a 2009 Inauguration Day GOP session that reportedly ended with a plan to block the
president at every turn was attended by influential legislators from every corner of the
Republican Party.
Likewise, all elements of the party are united in their questioning of the Obama
administration’s actions in Benghazi, Libya. Benghazi raised questions of military
strategy and the leadership capabilities of national Democrats, including a seeming
unwillingness of the national government to agree to a full investigation of what had
occurred. Republican leaders wanted to know whether adequate security was provided to
government officials at risk in Libya. Libertarians could question the role of domestic
governments in addressing international laws and the costs associated with such efforts.39
17The outrage over the events at Benghazi were in sharp contrast to divisions within GOP
when the United States first became involved in toppling the Qaddafi regime, with some
Republicans seeking deeper involvement and some preferring a lighter touch. While
Republicans agreed that the administration was making bad foreign policy, there was
little agreement as to the better alternative. But after an election in which Benghazi
played a critical role—Romney and Obama clashed over the issue in a presidential
debate—there was scant reason not to attack Obama on the issue.
Scenario 2: Libertarianism as Outlier
While all factions agree on the need to confront the administration on Benghazi,
Republicans enjoy lesser consensus on other national security issues. In particular,
libertarians generally oppose foreign intervention, an approach to foreign policy that is
very much in line with the conservative isolationism of previous decades, and it has been
rejected by most modern-day Republicans.
A new twist on the old isolationism is the use of unmanned air vehicles (UAVs),
or “drones.” For most Republicans, drones are a cost-effective way to fight terrorism
without putting Americans at risk of harm. But for Rand Paul, drones represent a threat
to human and constitutional rights. During confirmation hearings of CIA Director John
Brennan, Paul launched a personal campaign against drones. 40 Paul thereafter started a
thirteen-hour filibuster aimed at forcing Brennan to state he would not use drones on
American soil against American targets. Paul’s argument went to liberty and rights, and
even Madisonian ideals: “[Obama] was elected by a majority, but the majority doesn’t get
to decide who we execute.” Ultimately, Paul knew his efforts would be for naught; he
went as far as to state that few others in the body would have the guts to stand with him:
“I would suggest that this is a reflection of the fact that the American people are
frustrated. They are frustrated that they feel too few elected officials in Washington
stand for our rights, are willing to rock the boat, are willing to stand up and say the
Constitution matters and it matters whether it's popular or not.” 41 For Paul, the national
18security benefits of drones did not outweigh the attending costs to liberty. Pragmatic
Republicans disagreed. Arizona Senator John McCain, who said, “If Mr. Paul wants to
be taken seriously he needs to do more than pull political stunts that fire up
impressionable libertarian kids in their college dorms. He needs to know what he's
talking about.” 42
Scenario 3: Traditionalism as Outlier
For traditionalists, marriage is sacred and should be reserved for “one man and one
woman.” A Pew Research poll found that “While registered voters as a whole are closely
divided on same-sex marriage (42% in favor, 49% opposed), Tea Party supporters oppose
it by more than 2-to-1 (64% opposed, 26% in favor).” 43 But the importance of the issue
seems to vary greatly. Ron Paul has said he stated a personal opposition to same-sex
marriage but believes the question should be handled by the several states. This
relatively weak opposition lies in contrast to the views of traditionalists who frame same-
sex marriage in terms of protecting the family, especially the protection of children, , a
position that reflects the main thrust of 1970s opposition to gay and lesbian teachers in
public schools. Neurosurgeon Ben Carson, who was hailed by Tea Party supporters after
he criticized the Affordable Care Act at a National Prayer Breakfast attended by
President Obama, has made a more directly biblical claim. Carson told the Illinois
Family Institute, "When people come along and try to change the definition of marriage,
they are directly attacking the relationship between God and his people," Carson said,
“And that’s the reason it’s so important for them to change the definition, because if you
can get rid of that, you can get rid of everything else in the Bible too.” 44 But even if the
issue can be framed as religious liberty, the passion of traditionalists is not matched by
pragmatists and libertarians, and so the issue has had little traction.
Even more complicated is immigration reform. Republicans generally agree that
immigration laws in the United States are broken, but the search for a remedy seems
interminable. Pragmatic opposition to illegal immigration points to the fiscal and
19economic consequences of controlled borders, but a traditionalist approach is more
ontological. Crossing the border without passing through border control illegally is a
crime, and offering a “path to citizenship” to undocumented people amounts to amnesty,
especially if such a path rewards bad behavior or jumps “illegal immigrants” ahead of
legitimate seekers of citizenship who have been in line for a “green card” for years.
Libertarian thinking, however, is more conflicted. A research report from the libertarian-
leaning Cato Institute reported on a survey of Tea Party supporters: “On both
immigration and abortion, libertarians (as reflected in that party’s platforms over the past
three elections), take positions quite distinct from the Republican Party and from many
other Tea Party supporters. [Regarding immigration], and about 12% less likely to
support stricter limits on immigration.” 45 Many pragmatists, meanwhile, including
business leaders, support reform. Mitt Romney frequently said, “If you get an advanced
degree here, we want you to stay here—so we will staple a green card to your diploma.”
A pragmatist who recognizes the importance of Latino voters to the future of the
Republican Party would not likely support the traditionalist position. 46 In October 2013,
the complexity of the immigration question, which had bedeviled George W. Bush
several years early, turned Senator Marco Rubio against his own proposal for an overhaul
of the existing system.
Scenario 4: Pragmatism as Outlier
Republican pragmatists argue against deficit spending and excess spending from a
practical approach that the long-term negative impacts of such spending will override any
short-term benefits. 47 Pragmatic Republicanism has typically been associated with
commitments to free trade, balanced budgets, and low debt. Deficit conscious leaders
may sometimes be willing to even increase taxes to balance the books. Among the Tea
Party activists, however, taxes and spending are distinctly moral issues that are reflected
in debt and deficit. A pragmatist might argue that reduced government spending and
lower taxes will stimulate the economy and put more money in people’s pockets. To the
20libertarian mind, taxation is theft, and government regulation portends government
control, and to the traditionalist, big government can be anti-biblical. Before moving to
the Heritage Foundation, Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina argued that “America
works, freedom works, when people have that internal gyroscope that comes from a
belief in God and Biblical faith…I’ve said it often and I believe it—the bigger
government gets, the smaller God gets. As people become more dependent on
government, less dependent on God.” 48
Hyperbole aside, intense opposition to spending can be clearly seen in opposition
to disaster relief. When Tea Party Republicans voted against aid for the victims of
Hurricane Sandy, legislators from the Northeast struck back. Republican Peter King of
New York fumed,
My relationship with Congress will never be the same again. They made
us wait 90 to 100 days to give the most basic human aid. It was absolutely
disgraceful. When I see these Republicans slapping each other on the back,
all the camaraderie, ‘Hey, we’re great friends.’ All I know is that there were
people close to dying in my district and nobody gave a damn. That’s not
something I’m not going to forget. 49
By contrast, Representative Steve King, who voted against both Sandy aid and the second
wave of Hurricane Katrina aid, worried that federal money would be spent on “Gucci
bags and massage parlors” rather than rebuilding homes and infrastructure. 50
If the size and reach of government is a moral issue, not a pragmatic issue, then
fierce opposition to compromise on spending bills and government debt makes sense.
Building off the debt ceiling debate of 2011 and the battle over the “fiscal cliff,” the 2013
shutdown highlighted differences between pragmatists and the Tea Party. Pragmatic
Republicans sought advantageous compromise. They believed a Republican-friendly
solution would fail to pass through either a Democratic-controlled Senate and could not
survive a presidential veto. So rather than risking all political capital on a losing
21proposition, pragmatism would counsel a workable resolution that satisfied the wants of
both parties as much as possible.
Republicans like Peter King were calling for moderation. Traditionalists and
libertarians, however, favored a principled stand. Led by Ted Cruz, these sectors of the
Republican Party were willing to endure a shutdown in order to delay implementation of
the ACA. Libertarians and traditionalists came together and opposed the pragmatic wing,
the “Surrender Caucus.”
Notably, while national conservative groups like Club for Growth, FreedomWorks
and Heritage Action for America insisted that any deal to end the shutdown or raise the
debt ceiling until the ACA was dismantled or delayed, 51 Americans for Prosperity argued
that Obamacare was a long-term issue, not a reason for obstruction at this level. 52 But on
the debt ceiling Americans for Prosperity pushed hard. It opposed any compromise that
was not accompanied by cuts, and once the GOP leadership in Congress reached
agreement with Democrats, the group’s dissatisfaction was made clear: “Our activists are
more engaged than ever in this fight, and we intend to hold politicians accountable for
their promise to stop overspending.” 53 A news release from Tea Party Express made the
same point: “The politicians in Washington seem totally out of touch with the American
people. The Tea Party has sprung up because people were upset with excessive spending
and debt, a weak economy and crony capitalism.” 54 Republican pragmatists called the
episode a Tea Party loss. 55
DISCUSSION
The Madisonian design of American government protects minority interests by
separating powers and providing checks and balances. In the Senate, custom and rule
auger against closing debate. While the House of Representatives is based on majority
rule, the House itself is one chamber in one branch of the national government and
22therefore allows a minority party to wield influence in times of divided government.
Whether or not the Framer’s would have desired routine filibusters in the Senate and
closed rules in the House, the contemporary structure permits intense minorities like Tea
Party legislators to stand up for their positions and obstruct legislation as it deems
necessary. In a parliamentary system, there is little opportunity to tack advantage of
disunity, but the American system specifically allows for it, even as critics would claim
that the Tea Party is breaking with norms of legislative comity. While Tea Party
traditionalists and libertarians can use the Madisonian design to voice their concerns,
GOP pragmatists can find themselves crowded out of the debate when they lose their
ability to bargain with Democrats.
The American system geographically defined by winner-take-all elections further
strains the Republican Party by keeping discontented Tea Party Republicans inside the
ranks of the GOP. The two-party system illuminated by Maurice Duverger is hostile to
the emergence of a “third party,” 56 so conservative movements need to find way to
operate within the existing party system, as conservative Democrats learned in the 1960s
and 1970s. When southerners felt abandoned by their historic party, they first shifted to
Wallace’s American Independent Party and then into a Republican Party that was
courting their votes. The Tea Party cannot split off the GOP and start its own separate
party—as might be expected in a parliamentary system—but it can remake the party in
which it resides. It can recruit candidates, and where necessary it can run a traditionalist
or a conservative against a pragmatist. In states, districts, and localities where the party
faithful can be assured of victory in the general election, the energy that pours into a
Republican primary can help clarify the choices that Republican voters face. (Ted Cruz
does not have to worry about national polls so long as Texans are satisfied with his
work.) Traditionalists or libertarians in safe seats (including those that have been
redistricted to remain safe) can disregard pragmatists if they so choose.
23The electoral downside for Republican pragmatists can be seen in marginal
jurisdictions. Some Republicans have argued that Tea Party candidates have cost the
party key seats in the U.S. Senate. Sharron Angle’s failure to defeat Senate Majority
Leader Harry Reid and Christine O’Donnell’s loss in the general election after beating a
sitting Republican in the primary are frequently mentioned. In 2012, Tea Party
Republicans lost promising Senate races in Missouri and Indiana after they made
puzzling references to rape and abortion. Michael Barone lamented the party’s “unforced
errors” and saw both good and bad in the Tea Party, which, he said, “brings some
talented people into politics—think of Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson for example—but
it also brings some wackos and weirdos and witches, and we put too many of them on the
ticket.” 57 The national coordinator for the Tea Party Patriots, however, digs in: “I think
we have not been as successful as we like. It is an impermeable steel bubble. We are
really, really realizing that in order to have an impact it is going to have to come from the
ground up—from the cities, the counties and the states.” 58
Atlantic Weekly has stated that the Tea Party’s national ambitions were finished,
Huffington Post argued that gains from 2010 were lost in 2012, and NPR claimed the
movement was assessing damage. 59 And yet, given its deep historical roots and strategic
position, the Tea Party is likely to endure. In 2013, it maintains its impact American
politics. In Virginia, the Tea Party primaried presumptive Republican gubernatorial
candidate Bill Bolling (the sitting lieutenant governor) and instead opted for state
attorney general Ken Cuccinelli. Cuccinelli, while a statewide office holder, provides for
a weaker candidate than Bolling and could potentially cost Republicans in a race where
they were expected to have a significant advantage in a strong year. 60 Now, Cuccinelli is
even having to contend with a bona fide libertarian candidate in the race—Robert
Sarvis—who has been polling around ten percent. 61 In Colorado, Americans for
Prosperity is set to spend more than $350,000 on a school board race in South Douglas (a
district nationally-known for its efforts to create a true free-market for education.) 62
24Even in a year lacking many big ticket elections, the Tea Party continue to exert influence
within American electoral politics.
American conservatism in general, and Tea Party conservatism in particular,
justify themselves on grounds that go to core American principles, and these principles
are amenable to easy description. Unlike, say, the Occupy Wall Street movement of
2011, which prided itself on diversity of opinion, and which rapidly lost relevance after
an initial surge of media attention, the Tea Party movement is in possession of ideas that
have been stress-tested for several decades. From Taft through Reagan, and into the
twenty-first century, conservatives have learned what works and what does not. The
express racial animus of the 1960s and the embrace of extremism that was attached to
anti-communism have been discarded. The internationalism of neo-conservatism is
scrutinized now more than it was in the years immediately following the attacks of
September 11, 2001. With a tight message and troops to deliver it, Tea Party activists are
rarely flummoxed by hard questions. They have answers.
For Republican pragmatists, Tea Party durability easily becomes problematic. In
2010, Republican Senators Mike Castle of Delaware and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska were
cast aside in favor of Tea Party-backed candidates little general election potential. In
Utah, in 2012, Mike Lee defeated incumbent Republican Senator Bob Bennett. Even
when Tea Party candidates do not pose an actual threat, the potential resides in the
background. In August of 2013, a series of Tea Party operations in Texas counties
warned Senator Lamar Alexander to retire from office since “our great nation can no
longer afford compromise and bipartisanship, two traits for which you have become
famous.” 63 Other comparatively moderate legislators—Senator Saxby Chambliss of
Georgia, Senator Olympia Snowe of Maine, and Congressman Steve LaTourette of
Ohio—have retired in the midst of Tea Party politics. Grover Norquist, a life-long
libertarian who created the well-known Americans for Tax Reform’s “Taxpayer
Protection Pledge,” captured the frustration of pragmatists in his assessment of Ted Cruz’
25approach to politics: “He [said he] would lead this grassroots movement that would get
Democrats to change their mind. So the House passed it, it went to the Senate, and Ted
Cruz said, oh, we don’t have the votes over here…He pushed House Republicans into
traffic and wandered away.” 64
Still, while some moderates in the GOP may dislike Tea Party tactics, and while
Democrats often dismiss the Tea Party as a well-funded faction of uninformed voters
having vaguely dubious goals, the strength of the Tea Party movement is drawn from its
deep roots in the history of American conservatism and its strategic position in
contemporary American politics. Tea Party ideas draw heavily from libertarian and
traditionalist thinking, and the American system of government provides an opportunity
to voice minority opinions even when activists lack governing power. They can freely
employ the legislative tools of obstruction. As Chris Parker explained in a recent
interview with the Washington Post, “People don’t fully appreciate how committed the
tea party is to not compromising and not capitulating.” 65 When pragmatists can bring
Tea Party legislators on board, the alliance is powerful. When the libertarians and
traditionalists disagree with each other, Republican influence is diminished. However,
when the Tea Party is unified against pragmatist goals, it can be a disruptive force that
pragmatic Republicans would like to wish away, but cannot.
26NOTES
1
MJ Lee, “Government shutdown: Wall Street angry at Tea Party it has no control over,”
Politico, October 3, 2013, http://www.politico.com/story/2013/10/government-shutdown-wall-
street-tea-party-97734.html.
2
Face the Nation, October 20, 2013. Lexis-Nexis.
3
Abby D. Phillip, “Ted Cruz Has Yet to Prove Himself, US Chamber Chief says,” ABCNews,
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2013/10/ted-cruz-has-yet-to-prove-himself-us-chamber-
chief-says/, retrieved 10/31/2013.
4
Jim Forsyth, “Senator Cruz Returns to Texas Welcome after Shutdown Battle,” Reuters,
October 20, 2013. Lexis-Nexis.
5
Jonathan Tilove, “Tea Party Principles: Dewhurst and Patrick Want to Do away with Direct
Election of Senators,” Austin Statesman, October 10, 2013. Lexis-Nexis.
6
Jonathan Bernstein, “Scenes from a broken Republican Party,” WashingtonPost.com, October
18, 2013. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2013/10/18/scenes-from-a-
broken-republican-party/. Retrieved October 31, 2013.
7
Ibid.
8
Kevin Robillard, “Cruz slams fellow GOP senators,” Politico, October 20, 2013,
http://www.politico.com/blogs/politico-live/2013/10/cruz-slams-fellow-gop-senators-
175492.html.
9
Abramowitz, Alan, “Partisan Polarization and the Rise of the Tea Party Movement”, Paper
presented to the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association; Amanda Fallin,
Rachel Grana, and Stanton A. Glantz, “To Quarterback behind the Scenes, Third-Party Efforts:
The Tobacco Industry and the Tea Party.” Tobacco control (2013); Angie Maxwel and T.
Wayne Parent, “A ‘Subterranean Agenda’? Racial Attitudes, Presidential Evaluations, and Tea
Party Membership,” Race and Social Problems (2012): 1-12; Michael Minkenberg, “The Tea
Party and American Populism Today: Between Protest, Patriotism and Paranoia.” Der Moderne
Staat–Zeitschrift für Public Policy, Recht und Management 4:2 (2011); Theda Skocpol and
Vanessa Williamson, The Tea Party and the Remaking of Republican Conservatism (Oxford:
Oxford University, 2011).
10
David Farber, The Rise and Fall of Modern American Conservatism: ASshort History
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University, 2010).
11
Abramowitz, “Partisan Polarization.”
12
See Thomas E. Mann and Norman J. Ornstein, It’s even worse than it looks: How the
American constitutional system collided with the new politics of extremism. (New York: Basic
Books, 2012).
13
Gary C. Jacobson, “The Republican Resurgence in 2010,” Political Science Quarterly 126
(Spring 2011): 27-52.
14
Ronald Reagan, “A Time for Choosing,” October 27, 1964.
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