In Dallas this week, the Republican Party gathered not merely to organize for midterm elections but to perform something older and more elemental: the ritual of succession. Vice President JD Vance stepped forward as the designated heir to a political movement that has reshaped American conservatism, while Donald Trump himself appeared to remind the faithful that his name remains the animating force on the ballot. What unfolded was less a convention than a coronation rehearsal — a party signaling, with unusual clarity, where it believes its future lies.