Letter from Washington

The Republican Party may not be dead, but it grows increasingly difficult here to determine just what vital functions it continues to perform. The congressional leadership speaks bravely of its effective role as the loyal opposition, yet in those rare legislative instances which could be partially interpreted as Republican victories—the defeat of the common situs bill, for instance—Republicans have in effect helped the Carter Administration out of tight public-relations spots by taking the position the President preferred but was unable to advocate openly. And in matters such as the fight over the $50 rebate, which few here consider to be an earthshaking matter, the outcome hinges more on intraparty Democratic squabbles than on any clearly defined set of Republican policies and principles. In fact, few of the surviving Republicans on the Hill can any longer delineate a set of policies and principles that appear uniquely Republican.

In part, the problem is one of leadership, as witness, for instance, the embarrassing backtracking over Carter’s proposal for election day voter registration. Such a scheme, as any high school civics student knows, would work heavily in favor of the Democrats. Yet when it was first proposed, there were Howard Baker, John Rhodes, and William Brock, all talking as if a plan for easy and universal voter registration was the greatest thing since bean soup. Each has since backed off, and all are busy today painfully explaining to grassroots Republicans that they really didn’t say what they seemed to be saying at all. “It’s a no-win situation,” says one veteran Republican speech-writer. “We’re looking for gimmicks and flip-flopping all over the place. We just don’t have a message any more. And if we did, there’d be nobody to deliver it. So we just grind out the same old dreck, throw in a few meaningless absurdities like ‘the party of the open door,’ and just hope they can read it without getting their tongues caught in their cavities.”

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The Republican Party may not be dead, but it grows increasingly difficult here to determine just what vital functions it continues to perform. The congressional leadership speaks bravely of its effective role as the loyal opposition, yet in those rare legislative instances which could be partially interpreted as Republican victories—the defeat of the common situs bill, for instance—Republicans have in effect helped the Carter Administration out of tight public-relations spots by taking the position the President preferred but was unable to advocate openly. And in matters such as the fight over the $50 rebate, which few here consider to be an earthshaking matter, the outcome hinges more on intraparty Democratic squabbles than on any clearly defined set of Republican policies and principles. In fact, few of the surviving Republicans on the Hill can any longer delineate a set of policies and principles that appear uniquely Republican.

In part, the problem is one of leadership, as witness, for instance, the embarrassing backtracking over Carter’s proposal for election day voter registration. Such a scheme, as any high school civics student knows, would work heavily in favor of the Democrats. Yet when it was first proposed, there were Howard Baker, John Rhodes, and William Brock, all talking as if a plan for easy and universal voter registration was the greatest thing since bean soup. Each has since backed off, and all are busy today painfully explaining to grassroots Republicans that they really didn’t say what they seemed to be saying at all. “It’s a no-win situation,” says one veteran Republican speech-writer. “We’re looking for gimmicks and flip-flopping all over the place. We just don’t have a message any more. And if we did, there’d be nobody to deliver it. So we just grind out the same old dreck, throw in a few meaningless absurdities like ‘the party of the open door,’ and just hope they can read it without getting their tongues caught in their cavities.”