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Originally Posted by Yankees1212
Therefore, I just need to know when the old liberal way transitioned to the way it's interpreted today (STRICTLY in America only).
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It didn't exactly happen ovenight.
The classic liberalism of John Locke was about freedom and the right to the private ownership of property and goods.
It was in response to when nearly everything was owned by the King and royalty.
In this country it was also related to state's rights verses the power of the Federal government to decide who could own what and how much.
The modern Democrats were traditionally strong supporters of state's right in the Jefferson tradition.
And the early rise of the modern GOP was based on increasing Federal power at the expense of the states.
That's because there was a confusion of the political parties after the Federalists disappeared.
The GOP sort of became like the old Federalists, and Lincoln came in and establish national banks, a national currency, the first Federal income tax, emancipated slaves, enacted tariffs and generally increased the supremacy of the Federal go'vt. in order to preserve the union during a time of crises. But the crises had grown over a period of 100 years and the South was adamant about state's absolute rights and their right to own slaves.
During and after the Civil War with the rise of the industrial revolution, society started changing really fast due to the nature of mechanization and increased production. And that's where liberalism and conservativism really started switching from Laissez-faire to a more regulatory scheme in order to preserve freedom. With the rise of the industrial revolution there were monopolies created in nearly every industry.
It was around or just after the turn of the century and Teddy Roosevelt was President.
He rallied the progressive wing of the GOP against the corrupt state governments that were being controlled by corporate interests.
Among the industries that they controlled were sugar, steel, agriculture (Harvest), oil, tobacco, timber, railroads etc...
That's when the ideological switch really accelerated.
Child labor laws were enacted and there was the rise of unionism.
TR coined the phrase about giving folks a "Square Deal" or their fair share and he became a "Trust Buster".
That was due to the fact that many police were privately hired by corporations and they were willing to commit murder in the name of the state to protect corporate interests.
After the turn of the century, it was becoming more recognized by government that corporate monopolies were not in the best interest of society.
They tended to exploit people with higher prices, lower wages, poor working conditions, discriminatory hiring practices, etc...
Society realized that government regulation was required to preserve freedom from the uncontrolled free market forces.
New conservativism wanted to preserve more of the free markets and corporate power.
While the new liberals wanted regulations to preserve freedom through progressive political action, to protect people from corporations and monopolies
That marks the rise of the progressive movement with the likes of Robert M. La Follette, Sr of Wisconsin who advocated government control of electricity and the railroads. He received 17% of the Presidential popular vote in 1924.
Ever since then, there was a turn around about whether the corporations were stealing freedom away from the common people or whether they were producing freedom for the common people through wages and the production of goods.
Of course the corporations do both, but there's a balance that needs to be kept between regulations and non-regulation in order to do that.
Of course the conflict between liberalism (regulation) and conservativism (non-regulation) reached a crescendo with the Great Depression.
And that's when the Democrats suddenly became the new Federalists.
Who can say that it was by choice?
The stock market collapsed under the GOP watch due to the unrestricted credit to speculate on the futures market.
That marks the rise of the current social welfare state.
And that's where we are today.
What's intertwined are state's rights, corporate rights, multi-national corporations, toxic pollution & the environment, tariffs, subsidies to corporations and individuals, free trade agreements, what degree of pure capitalism can exist without some government intervention?
We have the banking industry, the stock market and corporations in control of pensions and credit, medical care in the control of private care givers and the insurance industry. These are very powerful interests and how to regulate them is always a source of conflict between liberals and conservatives.
Should they be regulated by the states, the Fed's, more or less, is based on how the political pendulum swings at any given time.
But one thing that's for sure, is that neither the GOP or the Democrats believe that government shouldn't be regulating anything. Rather it's always about the degree of regulation, the degree of benefits, the degree of government involvement, and which level or branch of government should be doing it.
Long ago Karl Marx predicted that pure capitalism was doomed to failure.
Ever since then, democratically elected governments around the world have struggled to solve the problem of how to rescue capitalism from this inevitable collapse. Many folks today don't like to admit that our government has done the best job of preserving freedom for all by limiting the amount of corporate regulation to only the amount that is necessary. That's why the US is looked up to around the world as the bastion of freedom.
We are the most liberal society in the classic sense and we do try to promote political freedom worldwide.
We know that democratically elected governments allow its citizens a choice about how much to regulate their own society.
Any attempt to change it dramatically could destabilize it enough to cause it to collapse.
Both parties know.
First there was an ideological switch about what the definition of liberalism was which coincided with the new interpretation of Federal powers.
Then there was a switch about which party was going to be regulating the corporate interests.
First it was the GOP, then it became the Dem's.
Since then, many social welfare programs were expanded by the GOP as well. By Nixon, and even under Bush with the Medicare prescription plan.
It's not like only one party does it all of the time.
They're both entrusted to protect capitalism and people's freedom to the best of their ability when they're elected into power.
That's just the nature of democratically elected governements.
And that also marks the practical nature of American politics which tends to be non-ideological.
It's not nearly as ideologically based as European politics is with all of their multi-party systems.
And that's why we have more freedom than they do.
Our parties are more willing to compromise, at least traditionally they have been.
Also because our societal values and Constitution are more conservative, or liberal in the classical sense.
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