Goldwater’s profound respect for the Constitution as it was written is key to his position on the 1964 Civil Rights Act of 1964 and to his insistence that he would voter for its passage if Section ll on equal employment opportunity was removed.
These sections, he believed were unconstitutional and unenforceable without the creation of a huge federal police force more dangerous to the Republic than the wrongs they were suppose to right.
Goldwater was not a segregationist but a constitutionalist.
He was a classic liberal in the Jeffersonian sense, concerned that the attempt to regulate private businesses as set forth by the civil rights bill was a giant step toward abolishing private property.
Yet many national leaders, from Walter Lippman to Pat brown to Roy Wilkins to Martin Luther King, called Goldwater a bigot, a racist, and even a Nazi, despite his Jewish heritage. They were blind to the fact that the nation’s more rabid racists and segregationists attacked Goldwater. The National States Rights party labeled him a “kosher conservative” and linked him with “Jewish espionage artists”. The American Nazi party picketed various Goldwater headquarters carrying signs that read, “Goldwater is a Race Mixer” and “Goldwater Supported the Red NAACP.”
Goldwater was not a segregationist but a constitutionalist.
He was a classic liberal in the Jeffersonian sense, concerned that the attempt to regulate private businesses as set forth by the civil rights bill was a giant step toward abolishing private property.
Yet many national leaders, from Walter Lippman to Pat brown to Roy Wilkins to Martin Luther King, called Goldwater a bigot, a racist, and even a Nazi, despite his Jewish heritage. They were blind to the fact that the nation’s more rabid racists and segregationists attacked Goldwater. The National States Rights party labeled him a “kosher conservative” and linked him with “Jewish espionage artists”. The American Nazi party picketed various Goldwater headquarters carrying signs that read, “Goldwater is a Race Mixer” and “Goldwater Supported the Red NAACP.”
Source: Goldwater: The Man Who Made a Revolution by Lee Edwards
