To NHGOP Liberty & Freedom Delegates:
I am pleased to have publicly endorsed the proposed NHGOP platform, which I believe to be a document that very eloquently articulates our values as Republicans (particularly in the Statement of Principles portion). I applaud the members of the platform committee for their diligent work and I look forward to meeting with all of you on Saturday to adopt it as our next party platform.
That said, there are still amendments that I would like to see to this platform, and I have submitted those suggestions to members of the platform committee. I hope they will consider these friendly amendments, and I hope you will consider supporting them as well:
- Restore language specifically opposing a sales or income tax by amending the bullet point “Oppose new taxes and fees” to read “Oppose new taxes and fees, especially a broad-based income or sales tax” or similar.
- Restoring language that specifically opposes funding for abortion and contraception. While not all here may be pro-life, I think we all agree that taxpayer money should not fund a procedure that violates the conscience of many New Hampshire citizens.
- Clarifying one bullet in the education language to read: “Amend the Constitution to overturn the poorly decided Claremont rulings and ensure educational funding and policy decisions are controlled by the people at the local level” or similar. This removes the reference to control by the people’s elected representatives, as that language is overly broad and could be used to justify state-level education decision-making.
Finally, while I expect some contention during the platform amendment process, I think there is one additional important contentious item that the NHGOP delegates must take up.
The RLCNH will attempt to bring forward a resolution that condemns the new RNC rules that disenfranchise the GOP grassroots, including the way in which they were adopted. (For those of you unfamiliar with the controversy in Tampa and how the rules were changed to take power from the grassroots, there are some good online articles from Freedomworks and Michelle Malkin that sum it up). Here is the text of the resolution that we will attempt to put forward.
Whereas, the management of the Republican National Convention in Tampa displayed a blatant disregard for the rules under which the convention committees and convention’s general business session were supposed to be conducted;
Whereas legitimately elected delegates were removed from their delegations, members of the rules committee were removed or prevented from voting and there was an organized effort to silence dissent and disregard the results of votes during the national convention;
Whereas, fraud and coercion were used to pass new rules which reduce the power and autonomy of state and local party organizations and impose a top-down structure of governance in place of the party’s traditional bottom-up structure;
Whereas, the changes to Rule 12 of the party rules give unprecedented power to the national committee to change party rules without the input and approval of state parties and their members;
Whereas, the changes to Rule 16 (formerly 15) of the party rules take away the ability of local parties to determine how they select and bind their delegates to the national convention and gives undue weight to popular votes in states which do not control primary voting based on party affiliation;
Whereas, it is to the benefit of the party to continue a tradition of popular election of delegates through the caucus process and protect diversity and preserve the traditional and unique practices of the state parties;
Therefore be it resolved that:
We reject the legitimacy of all of the changes to the party rules passed at the Tampa convention and consider the 2008 rules to remain in effect.
We assert the primacy of the state parties in determining policy for conducting party elections, nomination of candidates and apportionment of delegates within their states without the interference of the national committee or any campaign or outside authority.
I hope that you will join me and my fellow RLCNH activists in supporting this resolution and making clear to the RNC that this is a grassroots party and we will not go quietly while they take our power away.
I welcome your feedback on these items, and I hope you will support them on Saturday. If you know of any other delegates who may be supportive of these initiatives, please feel free to forward it to them.
Regards,
Carolyn McKinney
Chairman, RLCNH
