The 1856 platform of the Republican Party makes for some interesting reading. Yes, most of it pertains to slavery. But the rest is dedicated to advocacy for a new transcontinental railroad and accompanying “emigrant” road, plus “improvement of rivers and harbors.” Federally-funded infrastructure projects were the domain of the Whig Party, and were of special interest to those with the capital to benefit from improvements to commerce. Capturing the support of these monied interests allowed the Republican Party to win the White House in 1860 and drive the Whigs out of existence.

If anyone wants to replace the Republican Party with something new, they will have to be very well financed, and that means they’ll need to win the support of modern day capitalists. The opportunity should be there to do this, but it won’t be easy.

I agree with Steve M. that it’s time for concerned citizens to go beyond threatening to leave the GOP and to actually do it. Still, it’s encouraging to see roughly 100 Republicans announce their intention to create new party if the craziness in the Republican Party does not soon abate.

More than 100 Republicans, including some former elected officials, are preparing to release a letter this week threatening to form a third party if the Republican Party does not make certain changes, according to an organizer of the effort.

The statement is expected to take aim at former President Donald J. Trump’s stranglehold on Republicans, which signatories to the document have deemed unconscionable.

“When in our democratic republic, forces of conspiracy, division, and despotism arise, it is the patriotic duty of citizens to act collectively in defense of liberty and justice,” reads the preamble to the full statement, which is expected to be released on Thursday.

It’s important to remember that the Republican Party would never have survived as a third party. It had to replace the Whigs as the one of the two major parties to assure its continued existence. Certainly, winning the Civil War made this an easier task, but it was also accomplished by cobbling together a new coalition rather than simply taking over the Whigs’ preexisting one.

The starting point, however, is rendering the Republicans nonviable by peeling off enough of their support to make them uncompetitive in national elections and as many state and local elections as possible. When this happens, the money will head their way as the only realistic alternative to the Democrats.

What this means is that the first job is to split the right and hand the Democrats a lot of power. Then they have to be prepared to step up as the opposition to this power. It’s okay for them to be a weak opposition at first, just so long as they become the main opposition. Eventually, the pendulum will swing their way.

A major challenge is convincing donors to have this kind of patience and long-term vision. Another problem is creating a coherent and cohesive message. The original Republican Party was hardly pure. It may have been anti-slavery but it also made common cause with Know-Nothing xenophobes. It’s this latter faction that the modern day splitters are trying to move away from as fast as they can. Most Republican voters currently support Trumpism, and it will be very hard to win elections if a good number of them aren’t willing to come along for the ride.

There’s probably some progress that can be made by embracing regionalism, possibly including a heavy emphasis on competing initially in states with ranked choice voting or a system like California’s where all parties compete against each other in primaries. A new right-leaning third party can split the vote and hand the Democrats more power, and this is consistent with their short-term goals, but to actually win seats they will do far better in contests where the vote is not split.

They can also focus on blue states, especially in New England, where moderate Republicans often are quite popular, even today. A state like Maine that has adopted ranked choice voting, keeps electing moderate Republican Susan Collins to the U.S. Senate, and has a history of electing independent governors and senators, seems like a good place to start.

The new party absolutely needs to seed their movement with some actual lawmakers.

Overall, however, they probably need a major media presence on a par with Fox News, which is something that can absolutely be provided by moderate right-wing capitalists if they can be successfully pitched on the idea. The media presence is important because the electorate has been molded over several decades by Rupert Murdoch’s influence, and they can and must be moved in a different direction. Competing on the current playing field of public polarization will not be fruitful.

These are just some ideas for how I’d go about destroying the Republican Party and replacing it with a new, sane, right-wing party. I doubt anyone will listen, but then things are headed in such a catastrophic direction that perhaps people will have no choice.