> In many ways, the story of the "great conservative march from splinter
> to central committee" is really the story of "the DDE temporary
> shift." DDE was the only time in this century that the moderates ever
> took over that party and held power. And it was the exception that
> proved the rule.
That's not true. Herbert Hoover was a moderate-progressive. TDR, of course, was not a conservative by contemporary standards. Even W.H. Taft was not a "mossback" conservative. And of course Thomas Dewey and Wendell Wilkie were moderates or even mild liberals.
For the first quarter of the century the party was split between Western progressives, many of whom were proto-New Dealers, and mossback Eastern reactionaries. The party leadership was usually held by some compromise candidate who split the difference.
SA