Before pressing forward into the 80s, it's worth talking about the 60s a bit. Because my post on the 80s discusses in some depth the efforts undertaken by the Howard County Republicans to gain relevance politically in the county. And the Republicans were led intellectually by Bob Kittleman, he of the NAACP Education Committee and working with Silas Craft on the integration of the Howard County public schools.
There were many great African-American activists in the 1960s. But, they were only given that which the white male establishment would let them have. Integration of the HCPSS took eleven years, after all.
So I find irony when I see local conservatives take credit for integrating the county. For in the 60s as well as the 80s, a nickel's worth of difference separated a Howard County Republican from a non-Columbia Howard County Democrat. And when faced with the option of abandoning issues of racial equality in order to gain political market share, Howard County Republicans always, always did the latter.
Howard County's electoral color barrier was finally broken with the election of C. Vernon Gray to the Howard County Council in 1982. In the same year, William "Bill" Manning became the first elected African-American member of the Howard County Board of Education. This created a one-two punch against which non-Columbia Howard County, already dealing with their community's perceived usurping by the upstarts in Columbia, reeled.
But all was not lost for non-Columbia based local community leaders. Local "good ol' boys" in Hugh Nichols and Ned Eakle held the County Executive's spot from 1982-1986, and non-Columbia Democrats held the majority of Howard County's elected positions, led by the indomitable President of the Maryland Senate, Jim Clark. And in 1982, a Republican was elected to the state legislative delegation, as Bob Kittleman won a spot in the House of Delegates, representing District 14B.
There are some who say that the 2016 election of Donald Trump marked the election where national politics came to Howard County. It wasn't. It was the 1980 election of Ronald Reagan, followed by his 1984 re-election, that brought national politics home to roost in Howard County. Remember the era. The 1980s saw organizations like the Christian Coalition and Moral Majority ascendant. It saw the rise of the evangelical, the social conservative, the pro-life activist. And most importantly, the rise of the "Reagan Democrat"-- someone fiscally conservative, socially moderate, and hawkish in terms of national defense. Someone who believed in personal responsibility, and who were opposed to entitlement as a lifestyle and government interference in the free market, which Affirmative Action and Welfare, for example, were perceived to be.
Kittleman and the HoCo Republicans surmised that there were a lot of Reagan Democrats in Howard County. And so they set about finding them. Door to door, precinct by precinct. In fact, by the end of the 1980s, the Howard County Republican party had switched the registration of at least a dozen precincts from Democrat to Republican, through an aggressive program of door-to-door voter registration in which Democrats were encouraged to change their affiliation to Republican. Voters would be asked about what they think of "liberal Columbia Democrats" and how they're changing the county. And asked if they supported Ronald Reagan and the direction of the country. If the sentiments generated by the first question were negative and to the second, positive, then the person would be asked, "then why are you still a Democrat?" and handed a voter registration application to change their affiliation on the spot.
I have such a great memory of this because my father and grandmother were two such targets of those efforts. In fact my father turned Republican in the 1980s. My grandmother did not.
So how could the party of Kittleman encourage people to register with the anti- Affirmative Action, anti-racial and gender equity Republicans? This is but one of many paradoxes between local Republicans and their national counterparts. The easiest way I can explain it, is the Howard County Republicans dump their principles for political expediency faster than any local political organization I have ever been part of, or known. And did Bob Kittleman know of this particular paradox? Hell, yes he knew it. How did he feel about it? When asked about it he would shake his head, but it wasn't a shake against a falsehood, it was a shake of being unwilling to answer the question. Sadly, the real answer is lost to the ages. a Bob Kittleman memoir would have been an interesting read.
Further, my belief is that this is how Howard County, indeed Maryland, Republicans have honed their skill of always deflecting towards Democrats. Whenever asked about their being out of lockstep with each other or with their Federal counterparts, Maryland Republicans drop into their "Well, we're not the corrupt Democrats who have run Maryland for the last 40 years!" schtick. It's so much easier to be against than for. And eventually, if you can pull together enough people who are against varying things, you can win.
And a lot of things that a lot of people didn't like were going on in Howard County. Howard County added another almost 69,000 people in the 80s, making the total over 82,000 over 20 years. And much of that growth was outside of Columbia, as farms and rural properties in Ellicott City and Elkridge were bought and developed. And the 1986 elections brought a new wave of change to Howard County. Elizabeth Bobo became the first female and first Columbia County Executive in history, while two more Republicans were elected to office--Bob Flanagan to the House of Delegates alongside Bob Kittleman in District 14B and Charles Feaga to the County Council, in the newly-created District 5.
As the political and cultural divides grew between Columbia and Howard County outside of it, so too did the social divides. Columbia expressed itself more strongly as the unapologetic nexus of liberal thought in Howard County, be it through the activism of the Columbia Democratic Club, or be it through efforts in fighting handgun violence, ending nuclear proliferation, AIDS awareness, divestiture from South Africa, and many other of the leading social issues of the decade. With their former leader, Bob Kittleman, noticeably absent, the local chapter NAACP, under the leadership of the indomitable John Wright, flourished. And Columbia became more diverse as immigrants of the 80s-- refugees from Asian and Central American countries especially-- came to the new city to take advantage of it's relatively newer, inexpensive housing, good schools, and location in the middle of Howard County, in the middle of Maryland.
There was a lot for non-Columbia Howard County to be upset about. But, even though it had enjoyed recent election success, Howard County Republicans still felt like the mouse fighting the lion. County Executive Bobo had developed the county through the recession of the late 80s, and was seen by many as a future Governor as early as 1994, when she could no longer serve as Executive. So the Republicans convinced Chuck Ecker, a popular senior administrator in the HCPSS, to leave his job, switch parties, and run for County Executive. A fool's errand, it seemed. Until all the people who didn't like something about Columbia-led Howard County got together.
NEXT: A two party county and the red flag unfurls
