This study examines the social and political upheavals of the 1930s in the USA as viewed from the perspective of the minority party. The author introduces primary source material on the internal affairs of the Republican Party in the 1930s: data on campaign contributions, the affairs of the Republican National Committee, and the behaviour and attitudes of the GOP congressional delegation. He sheds new light on the Roosevelt landslide of 1936, explaining the Republican nomination of Landon and why the Republican party so badly miscalculated its prospects. He argues that the behaviour of the minority party is an essential component of the broader process of partisan reform, and that the behaviour of the Republican Party during this period contradicts the dominant view that political parties act rationally to maximize vote-gathering capability. By demonstrating how Republican miscalculations in the 1930s played into the hands of the emerging Democratic majority, this text points to the continuing importance of party elites - minority as well as majority - in the dynamics of political change.