Given any election season, there are certain phrases you are certain to hear. One such refrain comes from the Republican Party, who you will always hear trumpet themselves as the party of “Lincoln, [Teddy] Roosevelt, and Reagan.” They will also claim they are the party of Civil Rights because their forerunners abolished slavery and helped pass the Civil Rights Bill of 1964. These are important claims due to the cultural significance of these events, and both of these claims are indeed true. They are also, however, just a tad disingenuous for one very important reason – the Republican Party of today is not the same party of fifty years ago.