Republican Party Platform of 1972

Contents:

Community Development

For more than a quarter century the Federal Government has sought to assist in the conservationand rebuilding of our urban centers. Yet, after the spending of billions of dollars and the commitment of billions more to future years, we now know that many existing programs are unsuited to the complex problems of the 1970’s. Programs cast in the mold of the "big government" philosophy of the 1930’s are simply incapable of meeting the challenge of today.

Our Party stands, therefore, for major reform of Federal community development programs and the development of a new philosophy to cope with urban ills.

Republican urban strategy rejects throwing good money after bad money. Instead, through fundamental fiscal, management and program reforms, we have created a new Federal partnership through which State, county and municipal governments can best cope with specific problems such as education, crime, drug abuse, transportation, pollution and housing.

We believe the urban problems of today fall into these categories:

The fiscal crises of State, county and municipal governments;

The need for a better quality and greater availability of urban services;

The continual requirement of physical development;

The need for better locally designed, locally implemented, locally controlled solutions to the problems of individual urban areas.

In the last category—the importance of grass roots planning and participation—our Republican Party has made its most important contribution to solving urban problems.

We hold the government planners should be guided by the people through their locally elected representatives. We believe that real solutions require the full participation of the private sector.

To help ease the fiscal crises of State, county and municipal governments, we pledge increased Federal assistance—assistance we have more than doubled in the past four years. And, as stressed elsewhere in this Platform, we remain committed to General Revenue Sharing, which could reduce the oppressive property tax.

Our proposals for Special Revenue Sharing for Urban Development, transportation, manpower and law enforcement—all still bottled up by the opposition Congress—are designed to make our towns and cities places where Americans can once again live and work without physical or environmental hazard. Urban areas are already benefiting from major funding increases which we fought for in the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration programs and in our $10 billion mass transit program.

Urban areas are also benefiting from our new Legacy of Parks program, which is bringing recreation opportunities closer to where people live.

We are committed also to the physical development of urban areas. We have quadrupled subsidized housing starts for low and moderate income families since 1969, and effected substantial increases for construction of municipal waste treatment facilities.

We strongly oppose the use of housing or community development programs to impose arbitrary housing patterns on unwilling communities. Neither do we favor dispersing large numbers of people away from their homes and neighborhoods against their will. We do believe in providing communities, with their full consent, guidance and cooperation with the means and incentives to increase the quantity and quality of housing in conjunction with providing increased access to jobs for their low-income citizens.

We also pledge to carry forward our policy on encouraging the development of new towns in order to afford all Americans a wider range of residential choices. Additionally, our Special Revenue Sharing for Urban and Rural Community Development, together with General Revenue Sharing and nationwide welfare reform, are basic building blocks for a balanced policy of national growth, leading to better lives for all Americans, whether they dwell in cities, suburbs or rural areas.

Our Party recognizes counties as viable units of regional government with a major role in modernizing and restructuring local services, eliminating duplication and increasing local cooperation. We urge Federal and State governments, in implementing national goals and programs, to utilize the valuable resources of counties as area-wide, general-purpose governments.

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Chicago: "Community Development," Republican Party Platform of 1972 in Donald B. Johnson, Ed. National Party Platforms, 1840–1976. Supplement 1980. (Champaign-Urbana: University of Illinois), Pp.867-868 868. Original Sources, accessed March 28, 2024, http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=QBLHSP17SVWPYSL.

MLA: . "Community Development." Republican Party Platform of 1972, in Donald B. Johnson, Ed. National Party Platforms, 1840–1976. Supplement 1980. (Champaign-Urbana: University of Illinois), Pp.867-868, page 868. Original Sources. 28 Mar. 2024. http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=QBLHSP17SVWPYSL.

Harvard: , 'Community Development' in Republican Party Platform of 1972. cited in , Donald B. Johnson, Ed. National Party Platforms, 1840–1976. Supplement 1980. (Champaign-Urbana: University of Illinois), Pp.867-868, pp.868. Original Sources, retrieved 28 March 2024, from http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=QBLHSP17SVWPYSL.