CUMBERLAND COUNTY REPUBLICAN PARTY
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Where can I visit the Cumberland County GOP headquarters?
The Cumberland County Republican Party (CCGOP) has temporarily closed its brick and mortar headquarters. At the direction of the CCGOP Executive Board, the staff and the great Republican volunteers have been dispersed throughout the county reaching out to local voters and conducting essential planning activities rather than paying Fayetteville-area commercial rent. This will significantly reduce our costs but more importantly, this will allow our staff and volunteers to conduct critical community outreach to bring more citizens into the party, finding great candidates for office, and conducting essential training and fundraising efforts. As we get closer to 2023-2024 local, state and national elections, we fully intend to reopen a fully staffed headquarters. In the interim, you can contact CCGOP Chairman, Nina Morton at: [email protected] for any questions or assistance. Please note, CCGOP does not have paid staff and are a strictly volunteer-led organization. While we will get back with you as quickly as possible, we request a 48-hour response time.
If you would like to be involved as a CCGOP volunteer now or in the future, please reach out to Nina Morton at [email protected] or contact us at (910) 339-2011. You may also volunteer by accessing the CCGOP website at: https://cumberland.nc.gop.
Once the CCGOP Headquarters opens back up, we will ensure information is disseminated throughout the community.
I’m with a media outlet. How can I be granted access for an interview with the CCGOP?
Please submit all media inquiries by calling: 910-339-2011. Please note that because we are staffed only by volunteers and we are busy conducting essential community efforts to ensure Republican Party principles are being disseminated to area citizens, not all requests may be fulfilled immediately (but we’ll try!).
Are there ways to get involved in my neighborhood?
Absolutely! Because of the sheer size of Cumberland County (both in geography and in population!) we recognize that we cannot be based around a single headquarters. With more than 70+ county precincts, it is essential that we use volunteer citizens that live in the community neighborhoods to contact our current and potential Republicans within each precinct. We do this through Precinct Chairs. We are currently building our Precinct Chair roster and once each Chair is identified and trained, they will actively engage their communities by identifying neighborhood and block captains to assist at every level of Republican Party messaging. We will soon post the names and contact information of each Precinct Chair once they have all been identified and trained. You may also want to consider volunteering to be a Precinct Chair or a Precinct Assistant. These individuals are responsible for establishing voting operations during the elections and will also register voters throughout the year. To volunteer for the Republican Party, please contact our CCGOP Chair, Nina Morton at: ninamorton.[email protected]
In addition to volunteering to work in the various Precincts, we have several recognized auxiliary clubs that meet across Fayetteville and Cumberland County that you are highly encouraged to join in their community activities. Some of them include:
- Fayetteville Republican Women’s Clubwas chartered in 1972 with a focus on enabling, promoting and encouraging the residents of Fayetteville and surrounding areas to develop a strong, effective outreach of the Republican Party, advocating the support of the party’s philosophy and sponsoring the candidates that represent the essence of the Republican Party. The FRWC meets at 6:00 pm on the second Thursday each month at a local restaurant or facility. The CCGOP Web Page Event Calendar will normally identify meeting dates, times and location but you are also encouraged to join their Fayetteville Republican Women’s Club Facebook page and send a message for additional information.
- Cumberland County Republican Women’s is a member of the North Carolina Federation of Republican Women and the National Federation of Republican Women. The focus of the organization is to elect Republicans, men and women, to public office, to support their efforts, to let them know that their hard work and dedication to the people of our community, state and nation, are appreciated, and to also hold them accountable as elected Republican officials. The CCRWC actively participates in campaigning and promoting Republican goals and values such as smaller government, lower taxes to encourage economic development and personal responsibility while at the same time providing leadership training and opportunities for Republican women. The CCRWC meets at 6:00 pm on the second Tuesday each month at local restaurants. The CCGOP Web Page Event Calendar will normally identify meeting dates, locations and event times but you are also encouraged to join their CCRWC Facebook page or access their website at: www.ccrwc-nc.org. You can also email them at: [email protected]
- Cumberland Country Republican Men’s Club is dedicated to promoting and supporting Republican Party core values and provide social opportunities to men and women where people can share their political views among friends. The CCRMC is dedicated to increasing the effectiveness of men in the cause of good government as well as informing the public through political education and activity. CCRMC supports local charities to better our community and to increase awareness of the Republican Party. Meetings are held in the evenings at 6:00 pm on the third Tuesday of the month at local restaurants. The CCGOP Web Page Event Calendar will normally identify meeting dates, locations and event times but you are also encouraged to join their Cumberland County Republican Men’s Club Page on Facebook to receive event notifications.
ELECTION FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Will the CCGOP recommend whom I vote for?
The Cumberland County Republican Party CANNOT make recommendations in contested Republican primaries. To do so would be a direct violation of our Plan of Organization (our governing rules). We will provide awareness of Republican Party candidates running for office. During the election seasons, primary and general, you can also see a complete list of Republican candidates by visiting: https://vt.ncsbe.gov and click on “Sample Ballot”. On this site, you’ll also find a wealth of information to include County Board of Elections Information, One-Stop Voting sites, Polling Place Search, and a Voter Search where you can identify voting information about yourself to include your voter details such as your Voter Registration Number, Date of Voter Registration, and other info. You will be able to identify your Election Day Polling Site, your Voter History, and a myriad of other information. If you encounter individuals that don’t know if they are a registered voter or not, provide them the website information above. We highly recommend you research all of the candidates for yourself or come to one of our local club meetings to hear from the candidates directly! Finally, during General Elections, the CCGOP will often provide Candidate Slate Cards that identify all the Republican Candidates that are running for office. Poll volunteers will often pass out these cards at polling sites.
How do I early vote?
During elections, primary and general elections, the public will be made aware of early voting periods, times and locations. Please note that you can only vote for the ballot for the Party that you are registered for (those unaffiliated voters may only choose 1 ballot – either the Republican or the Democrat – not both). All registered Cumberland County voters can vote at any of the early voting sites, not just the location closest to your residence.
Where do I vote and how do I see a sample ballot?
To find your precinct, view your sample ballot and other important voting information, please visit https://vt.ncsbe.gov, enter your information and click sample ballots. Please note that we do not coordinate volunteers at early voting and Election Day sites for primary elections. Please directly contact the candidate(s) of your choice if you would like to help during a primary election.
MISCELLANEOUS QUESTIONS:
Why does the Republican Party use an Elephant as its logo?
Elephants…strong, dignified, and harmless when calm, but unstoppable when threatened!
The Republican Party uses the elephant as an official logo and you will find it all over their web site and on plenty of official Republican merchandise, all thanks to Thomas Nast, an American cartoonist with Harper’s Weekly in 1862. Nast’s cartoons were very popular and his depiction is still the most widely used version of the holiday icon. Nast also drew many political cartoons that harshly criticized the policies of both the Democratic and Republican Party.
As for the elephant, Nast first used the behemoth to represent the Republicans in the 1874 cartoon “The Third Term Panic.” The cartoon depicts the Republican Party as a lumbering elephant about to walk off a cliff. As for why Nast chose an elephant, a common theory is that it is based on an old phrase of “seeing the elephant” which pro-Unionist Republicans used to mean that they had seen battle during the Civil War. Nast himself was a proud Republican and diehard-Unionist so it is entirely plausible he was aware of this phrase at the time.
Thomas Nast worked at Harper’s Weekly until 1886. It is an understatement to say that Nast’s cartoons were extraordinarily popular. President Abraham Lincoln referred to Nast as his “best recruiting sergeant” and President Ulysses S. Grant, one of the highest ranking Union generals, said that Nast had done as “much as any one man to preserve the Union and bring the war to an end.”
With praise like that (albeit from fellow Republicans), it isn’t hard to figure out why his symbolic animals would catch on with the public and other cartoonists as early as 1896. By 1926, Republicans were already embracing the elephant as an unofficial animal. In 1932, both animals were used as symbols of the parties on an official campaign poster for Republican incumbent Herbert Hoover. The elephant logo has represented the Republican Party ever since!
What does GOP stand for?
Grand Old Party! The initials synonymous with the Republican Party (GOP) stand for “Grand Old Party.” As early as the 1870’s, politicians and newspapers began to refer to the Republican party as both the “grand old party” and the “gallant old party” to emphasize its role in preserving the Union during the Civil War. The Republican Party of Minnesota, for instance, adopted a platform in 1874 that it said, “guarantees that the grand old party that saved the country is still true to the principles that give it birth.”
In spite of its nickname, though, the “grand old party” was only a mere teenager in the early 1870’s since the Republican Party had been formed in 1854 by former Whig Party members to oppose the expansion of slavery into the western territories.
The “grand old party” moniker was actually first adopted by the Republicans’ elder rival—the Democratic Party, which traced its roots back to Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson. In his 1859 inaugural address, Kentucky’s Democratic Governor Beriah Magoffin proclaimed, “The grand old party has never changed its name, its purposes, or its principles, nor has it ever broken its pledges.” The following year a Democratic newspaper in New Haven, Connecticut, looked ahead to the presidential election of 1860 and warned that “this grand old party is divided and in danger of defeat.”
The Republican’s GOP acronym began to appear in print in 1884. Newspapers in 1936 credited T.B. Dowden, a Cincinnati Gazette typesetter, with coining the initials after receiving a story about 1884 Republican presidential nominee James Blaine shortly before press time that ran too long. “My copy ends with ‘Grand Old Party,’ and I have two words left over after I’ve set the 10 lines. What shall I do?” Dowden asked his foreman. “Abbreviate ’em, use initials, do anything, but hurry up!” came the reply. In a rush, Dowden shortened the name of Blaine’s planned speech from “Achievements of the Grand Old Party” to “Achievements of the GOP.”