Nelson Rockefeller's Dilemma

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Nelson Rockefeller's Dilemma explores the complex political career of the four-time New York State governor and US vice president, highlighting the decline of moderate Republicanism and the compromises made for political power. Marsha E. Barrett examines Rockefeller's significant governorship, marked by liberal infrastructure projects, the expansion of the university system, and investments in local services and the social safety net. Amid the rising Civil Rights movement in the early 1960s, he envisioned a Republican Party that upheld its Lincolnian legacy of defending Black equality. However, the party's extreme right wing, emboldened by outreach to segregationists during Barry Goldwater's nomination, shifted the party further right. As Rockefeller's national ambitions waned by the late 1960s, he began to adopt conservative stances on social and racial issues, neglecting to support measures against police brutality and making unfounded accusations against Black welfare recipients, while also implementing harsh drug laws that disproportionately affected people of color. These departures from his principles did not garner him party loyalty, culminating in a vice presidency that ended in humiliation rather than the affirmation of moderate ideals. This insightful political history details how Rockefeller, a standard-bearer of moderate Republicanism, ultimately lost the struggle for the soul of the Party of Lincoln, paving the wa