The Hancock-Henderson Quill, Inc.
By David Grimes for The Quill
Henderson County Republicans and others from surrounding areas met at Country Fun Monday night to enjoy a Lincoln Day dinner and meeting for the first time in a decade.
In fact, the last Lincoln Day observance took place at the Riverview Supper Club in Dallas City, Henderson County Republican chairman Chuck Neff noted.
A long list of party notables-Andrea Zinga, Rich Myers, Dan Rutherford and Raymond Poe, who is running for Illinois lieutenant governor-were on hand to urge party faithfuls to take pride in the state GOP and work toward bringing new blood into the party ranks.
Poe, who is a Springfield representative from the smallest district in the state, urged those attending to return to "grass roots politics" and familiarize local communities with the several Republican candidates for governor who hope to challenge Rod Blagojevich in the 2006 election.
"There's not one who couldn't do a better job than this (current ) governor," he said.
Rutherford, a college fraternity brother of Neff's when the two attended college at Illinois State University, encouraged those at the dinner to close ranks and drop social and philosophical differences in order to close ranks within the party and avoid the rifts and divisions that have plagued Democrats in recent years.
"The state party is alive and well...but we have to come together on a number of issues," he said.
Keynote speaker and state senator Steve Rauschenberger, Elgin, said for the state party to move ahead and seek success at the polls next year it's important to put the legal troubles of former governor George Ryan in the past and work toward the party's future.
He noted the 26 years of Republican influence and accomplishment that preceded the Ryan years.
"There were 26 years of strong positive influence with governors like Jim Thompson and Jim Edgar. There was a strong Republican structure," he said.
Rauschenberger reminded those attending that two years after the Republican party was established Abraham Lincoln challenged Stephen Douglas in a race for a senate seat but lost to Douglas.
Douglas and the Democrats had defended the right of states to determine if they would allow slavery as one of the planks in their platform, but Lincoln later prevailed in his bid for the presidency.
Rauschenberger alluded to Douglas as "the Bill Clinton of his time," and to Blagojevich's economic policies as "pillaging."
"The time is ripe for us to differentiate ourselves (from Democrats)," he said.
But not all Rauschenberger's remarks were caustic and jaded Monday.
In his closing remarks he referred to the circus elephant struck down by lightning in Oquawka in the 1960s.
"I am proud to be this near the grave of Norma Jean," he quipped.