Until the 1960’s, future neo-conservatives shared the Democratic Party’s vehement anti-communism, acceptance of the Civil Rights Movement, and support for President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal welfare-state policies. Tellingly, the influential neo-conservative Richard Perle said in 2003 that he was still a registered Democrat, out of “nostalgia” for Henry “Scoop” Jackson, the powerful former Senator who embodied these commitments.