History
The RPF was founded in 1975 by three groups of orthodox Christians. The first group were members of the Protestant-Christian Anti-Revolutionary Party, secondly the National Evangelical Union, a small party which had earlier left the ARP, and several independent electoral committees. The founders opposed the formation of the Christian Democratic Appeal, because the Protestant ARP and Christian-Historical Union would join the Catholic People's Party. During the period of pillarisation, the Catholics and Protestants had lived in a form of cold war.
The RPF sought to unite all other orthodox Protestant Christian parties, namely the Reformatory Political Union (GPV) and the Reformed Political Party (SGP).
In the subsequent 1977 elections the RPF was unable to win any seats. In 1981 it won two seats in House of Representatives (Meindert Leerling and Aad Wagenaar). In the period 1981 to 2002 it had one to three members. It also won seats in the Dutch Senate. The remained in opposition throughout its existence.
In 1985 one of its two members of parliament seceded form the party to form the Anti-Revolutionaries 1985, the party never got any seat.
In 1996 RPF party leader Leen van Dijke came under public criticism when magazine Nieuwe Revu had suggested that in an interview he had declared: "Why would stealing, for example committing social welfare fraud, be less of a sin than going against the seventh commandment? Yes, why should someone in a homosexual relationship be better than a thief?" When turmoil broke out, Van Dijke explained that he had meant to convey a universally accepted vision within Christianity that trespassing one of God's commandments makes a man guilty before God, and that all breaches herein are equal. But the general public, and especially the Dutch gay movement, criticized the statement as printed in Nieuwe Revu heavily, considering it discrimination. As such, a gay magazine (Gaykrant) reported it to the Attorney General. In 1999 the Dutch high court ruled that Van Dijke's views were not discriminatory according to Dutch law.
From 1998 the RPF and GPV began to work closely together in parliament. In 2000 the Christian Union, in which both would unite was officially founded. In 2002 it first contested in elections and won 5 seats.
Read more about this topic: Reformatory Political Federation
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