"Confessions of a Republican" is a
political advertisement aired on television during the
1964 United States presidential election
The 1964 United States presidential election was the 45th quadrennial presidential election. It was held on Tuesday, November 3, 1964. Incumbent Democratic United States President Lyndon B. Johnson defeated Barry Goldwater, the Republican nomi ...
by incumbent president
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), often referred to by his initials LBJ, was an American politician who served as the 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. He had previously served as the 37th vice ...
's campaign.
Background of creation
In the advertisement, a man in his late twenties speaks to the camera about his pride in the Republican Party's past, before admitting that he is frightened by Republican nominee
Barry Goldwater
Barry Morris Goldwater (January 2, 1909 – May 29, 1998) was an American politician and United States Air Force officer who was a five-term U.S. Senator from Arizona (1953–1965, 1969–1987) and the Republican Party nominee for presid ...
. He expresses alarm at Goldwater's contradictory, confrontational political views and support from the
Ku Klux Klan
The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist, right-wing terrorist, and hate group whose primary targets are African Americans, Jews, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and Cath ...
(the result of his opposition to the
Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 () is a landmark civil rights and labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin. It prohibits unequal application of voter registration requi ...
) and says that he is afraid of Goldwater's instability and aggressive approach, and fears that it might lead to a
nuclear war
Nuclear warfare, also known as atomic warfare, is a theoretical military conflict or prepared political strategy that deploys nuclear weaponry. Nuclear weapons are weapons of mass destruction; in contrast to conventional warfare, nuclear ...
with the
U.S.S.R.
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...
He explains that he believes that the party is making a great mistake, and that he will be voting for Johnson in the election.
The four-minute ad was produced by
DDB in July 1964.
[Mann, Robert]
Daisy Petals and Mushroom Clouds
pp. 54-55 (2011) It was a requirement of the casting that actor
William Bogert
William Bogert (January 24, 1936 – January 12, 2020) was an American character actor best known for his roles as Brandon Brindle on the TV series ''Small Wonder (TV series), Small Wonder'' from 1985 to 1989, Kent Wallace, the host of ''Chappell ...
be a Republican. While Bogert was performing a script rather than expressing his own views and is not presented by name, he has described the ad as similar to his own viewpoint and said that he was allowed to improvise somewhat to include his own thoughts on the election.
Though less well-remembered than Johnson's "
Daisy" ad (also suggesting that Goldwater might start a nuclear war), it ran in the
North
North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography.
Etymology
The word ''north'' is ...
and was intended to develop fears about
Barry Goldwater
Barry Morris Goldwater (January 2, 1909 – May 29, 1998) was an American politician and United States Air Force officer who was a five-term U.S. Senator from Arizona (1953–1965, 1969–1987) and the Republican Party nominee for presid ...
and his supporters, such as the then head of the
Ku Klux Klan
The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist, right-wing terrorist, and hate group whose primary targets are African Americans, Jews, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and Cath ...
.
[Hendershot, Heather]
What's Fair on the Air?
p. 176 (2011)[(19 November 2014)]
Confessions of a Former Republican
Horseshoes and Hand Grenades Theatre
The
Museum of the Moving Image
The Museum of the Moving Image is a media museum located in a former building of the historic Astoria Studios (now Kaufman Astoria Studios), in the Astoria neighborhood in Queens, New York City. The museum originally opened in 1988 as the Amer ...
report on the ad notes that DDB contracted with the Democrats in the summer of 1963, after President
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination i ...
had been impressed by their quirky advertising for
Volkswagen
Volkswagen (),English: , . abbreviated as VW (), is a German motor vehicle manufacturer headquartered in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. Founded in 1937 by the German Labour Front under the Nazi Party and revived into a global brand post- ...
(the
Think Small
Think Small was one of the most famous ads in the advertising campaign for the Volkswagen Beetle, art-directed by Helmut Krone. The copy for Think Small was written by Julian Koenig at the Doyle Dane Bernbach (DDB) agency in 1959. Doyle Dane ...
campaign) and for
Avis
Avis is Latin for bird and may refer to:
Aviation
*Auster Avis, a 1940s four-seat light aircraft developed from the Auster Autocrat (abandoned project)
* Avro Avis, a two-seat biplane
* Scottish Aeroplane Syndicate Avis, an early aircraft built b ...
(the We Try Harder campaign). A DDB spokesman reportedly told Johnson's advisers that "We are deadly afraid of Goldwater and feel that the world must be handed a Johnson landslide."
Broadcast and later usage
Bogert was interviewed about the ad for its 50th anniversary in 2014, saying that he believed that Tea Party activists had many undesirable attributes in common with Goldwater, and that he had not voted Republican for a long time.
The advertisement was the subject of renewed attention in March 2016 because of
Donald Trump's success in Republican primaries.
[Freedlander, Adam (9 March 2016)]
A “Republican Confession” from 52 years ago has a lot to say about this year’s election
''Quartz (publication)
''Quartz'' is an online news platform in English. It is focused on international business news. Quartz is privately held and was established in New York City in 2012. It is published in the United States with global business news and has specifi ...
''[Micek, John L. (9 March 2016)]
Does this 1964 campaign commercial predict Donald Trump's future?
'' Pennlive.com'' Bogert, by then 80 years of age, was interviewed again on ''
The Rachel Maddow Show
''The Rachel Maddow Show'' (also abbreviated ''TRMS'') is an American liberal news and opinion television program that airs on MSNBC, running in the 9:00 pm ET timeslot Monday evenings. It is hosted by Rachel Maddow, who gained a public pr ...
'' on May 2, 2016 and asked to draw comparisons between Goldwater's 1964 policy stances and
Donald Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.
Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of P ...
's 2016 politics. He appeared in a remake of the advertisement produced by the
Hillary Clinton campaign in July 2016 with alterations based on Trump's public statements on nuclear warfare.
Confessions of a Republican , Hillary Clinton
/ref>
See also
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References
External links
Original ad
(On YouTube, uploaded by LBJ Presidential Library, July 9, 2014)
Snopes transcript
Video on The Living Room Candidate
with transcript
{{Authority control
1960s television commercials
1964 United States presidential election
Articles containing video clips
Barry Goldwater
Lyndon B. Johnson
Political campaign advertisements