it REPUBLICAN SENATORIAL INNER CIRCLE lOTH ...

HISTORY OF THE REPUBLICAN SENATORIAL INNER CIRCLE
Ten years ago, a Republican Revolution seemed out of the question. Many political
experts that year were predicting the victory of Ted Kennedy and the liberal wing of the
Democratic Party over Jimmy Carter and the tattered remnants of the Democrats'
moderate-to-conservative wing.
The whole concept of a Republican Senate Majority — let alone three consecutive
Republican Presidential landslides ~ seemed impossible.
However, Pennsylvania Senator John Heinz and his GOP colleagues ignored the experts
and quietly founded the Republican Senatorial Inner Circle in 1979. They set out
to recruit an elite group of business leaders, activists from civic groups and patriotic
Americans from all walks of life to map out and fund an unprecedented campaign blitz
against the Democrats who controlled the Senate.
Needless to say, the success of the Inner Circle exceeded the wildest expectations.
Republicans captured 12 Senate seats that were held by Democrats, While the strength
of Ronald Reagan's victory in 1980 was a catalyst for some of those victories, 5 of the
new GOP Senators actually ran ahead of Reagan in their respective states, attesting to
the Inner Circle's careful advance work.
Moreover, 1980 was no fluke. In the midst of the Democrat counterattack during the
recession year of 1982, the Inner Circle padded the Republican Senate Majority by one
additional seat. In 1984, working closely with the Reagan/Bush re-election campaign,
the Inner Circle helped maintain the majority against a determined and united
Democrat Party. Unfortunately, our string of successes was broken in 1986 with the
loss of 8 seats.
What's more, in those six years the Republican majority sustained by the Inner Circle
passed some of the most revolutionary legislation in American history. It started out by
cutting individual income taxes by 25% and cutting billions of dollars in fat from the
domestic budget. It revitalized our national defenses. And in its final year, it reformed
the tax code to bring down the highest tax rate down to 28%.
Having learned from our victories and defeats, the Inner Circle fortified Republican
defenses in 1988. We managed to hold our ground, even to capture 3 Democrat-held
Senate seats.
All told, Inner Circle candidate-support programs have helped elect 28 United States
Senators since 1980 — some of them in states which had never before sent a Republican
to the Senate — and re-elect many more incumbent Senate Republicans.
As the 1990 elections approach, Inner Circle members are committed to continuing this
string of victories. By winning just 5 Democrat-held Senate seats while holding on to
.fheJ&Repiihh'ran seats, theJpnerXirclewill begin its second decade on the same high
note as it began the first: by capturing a Republican Senate Majority that will workTwitE
George Bush in meeting the tremendous challenges facing our nation.
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