A clever Republican Party today could do worse than running on the Democratic Party’s 1932 platform, which begins:

“We advocate: 1. An immediate and drastic reduction of governmental expenditures by abolishing useless commissions and offices, consolidating departments and bureaus and eliminating extravagance, to accomplish a savings of not less than 25% of the cost of the Federal government. . .

“2. Maintenance of the national credit by a Federal budget annually balanced on the basis of accurate executive estimates within revenues. . .

“3. A sound currency to be preserved at all times. . .

“As an immediate program of action we must abolish useless offices. We must eliminate actual prefunctions of the government—functions, in fact, what are not definitely essential to the continuance of government. We must merge, we must consolidate subdivisions of government, and like the private citizen, give up luxuries which we can no longer afford.”

No wonder Ronald Reagan cast his first vote for president in 1932 for Franklin Roosevelt.