Andrew Jackson named the party the “Democratic Party” and, for more than 180 years, it has remained the Democratic Party. However, since the days of President Dwight Eisenhower, many Republicans have tried to rename it the “Democrat Party.”
The late Arlie DeJarnatt was a Democratic Party member of both the House and the Senate of the Washington state Legislature. In the 1960s, both DeJarnatt and this writer taught U.S. history at Robert A. Long High School in Longview. DeJarnatt told me that Herbert Brownell Jr., Eisenhower’s attorney general, told Republican leaders there would be political benefits if they always referred to the Democratic Party as the Democrat Party. Of course, there isn’t such a thing as a “Democrat” Party.
Lawrence S. Wagle
Longview
