Mississippi Republican Party

Mississippi Republican Party
Chairperson	Joe Nosef
Senate leader	Tate Reeves
House leader	Philip Gunn
Headquarters	P.O. Box 60, Jackson, Mississippi 39205
Ideology	Conservatism Fiscal conservatism Social conservatism
National affiliation	Republican Party
Colors	Red
Seats in the Upper House	31 / 52
Seats in the Lower House	67 / 122
Website
http://msgop.org/

The Mississippi Republican Party is the state affiliate of the United States Republican Party. The party chairman is Joe Nosef and is based in Jackson, Mississippi. The original Republican Party of Mississippi was founded following the American Civil War, the current incarnation of the Mississippi Republican Party was founded in 1956. The party would grow in popularity during the 1960s with wedge issues such as the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and today the party has the majority in the state.

In 1956, Wirt Adams Yerger, Jr., an insurance agent from Jackson, founded the modern Mississippi Republican Party and served as the first state chairman from 1956 until 1966. He was chairman of the Mississippi delegation to the Republican National Convention in 1956, 1960, and 1964. He was elected to a four-year term as chairman of the Southern Association of Republican State Chairman in 1960. In 2009, the central committee of the Mississippi Republican Party named Yerger Chairman Emeritus. The Mississippi Republican Party would grow in supporters with then President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who still twice lost the electoral votes of Mississippi. On September 24, 1960, Republican presidential candidate Richard Nixon campaigned in the state, the first time a presidential candidate had appeared in the state in more than a century. During the 1964 Republican National Convention Mississippi delegates would help nominate Barry Goldwater for President. Goldwater would go on to win 87 percent of the vote in Mississippi in the 1964 Presidential Election, the first time a Republican would win the state since the Reconstruction Era. Only once since 1956 has a non-Republican presidential candidate won the state of Mississippi, Jimmy Carter in the 1976 Presidential Election. In 1988, Republican Congressman Trent Lott would defeat Democratic Congressman Wayne Dowdy to replace retiring Senator John Stennis(D-MS).

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